Responserack vs Emergency Reporting System in 2024

Responserack is the middle-of-the-night simple Emergency Reporting System alternative your firefighters and administrators will love.

Replace records keeping with mobile information for your whole department

Legacy Emergency Reporting System was a pioneering product decades ago, and it helped fire departments keep records and run reports. However, Emergency Reporting System has been purchased by ESO and is being subsumed into the ESO product.  

Back Office Emergency Reporting is not accessible to most volunteer firefighters since it is NFIRS heavy; codes and drop downs and seas of grey boxes. ERS is a “back office tool” for administrators, and this misses the opportunity to inform and engage volunteer firefighters.  

ERS has multiple modules but it is a training burden for the organization. The many menus, and many options, are just plain hard to navigate for volunteer firefighters, especially in the middle of the night. The requirement to have a perfectly validated NFIRS report before saving is a tall order for many volunteers.

ERS is powerful, and even if it were not going away, it is too much for most volunteer departments.

Here are some of the benefits of Responserack:

• Mobile-friendly: Responserack works with mobile phones and tablets fore firefighters, and computers for administrators.
• Firefighter-friendly: Showing respect to volunteer time and other priorities, Responserack doesn’t get in the way. Simple is truly simple.
• Easy to use: Responserack is designed to be easy to use for both firefighters and administrators. Both can be volunteers, and both deserve their time to be respected.
• Affordable: Responserack is priced competitively, so you can get the features you need without breaking the bank.
• Secure/Reliable: Responserack is hosted in a secure cloud environment, so your data is protected.

If you are looking for a modern, secure, reliable, easy-to-use, and affordable solution for your volunteer fire department, then Responserack is the perfect choice for you.

Switching to Responserack

Switch to Responserack to meet your needs for NFIRS 5.0, and satisfy both your administration and firefighters. Volunteer fire departments can migrate to Responserack in under a week.

What sets Responserack apart from Emergency Reporting System (ERS)?

Modern / Mobile firefighters need the right information at the right time, they need mobile simplicity, and firefighters (especially volunteer firefighters) need limited NFIRS complexity. Firefighters need information delivered to them; effective tools designed for their needs, not designed by NFIRS compliance.

Responserack brings information up to the firefighter, on their terms; presenting it simply and effectively. Responserack engages firefighters with their fire department data.

Responserack helps firefighters, yet also powers administration.

Contact us here to learn more how Responserack helps your fire department:

More about the Responserack advantage:

• Simple member views; for incidents, attendance numbers and briefings.
• Computer Aided Dispatch (CAD) integration with digital membership dispatch notification.
• Incident management; for membership, for the department, for NFIRS.
• Events, Training and Meetings; for membership, and for the department.
• Communications; sharing information, images, videos amongst the membership.

• Automated incident review and administrative completion process.
• National Fire Incident Reporting System (NFIRS) entry, management, review and export.
• Insights & Reports presenting the incidents and member information.
• Visibility into your response, responders, apparatus and information.

• Automated tasks; reducing repetative administrative overhead.
• Integrations; integrations and webhooks to traditional and non-traditional Fire Department solutions.
• Dynamic Links; launch custom mobile applications, e.g. ArcGIS Collector, ArcGIS Field Maps.

How to select fire department software in 2025:

Check out our fire department software for our understanding of what to look for in fire department software today, and for the future. Times have changed and modern volunteer fire departments require different abilities to inform, engage and retain their volunteers.

Disclaimer: This website is not affiliated in any way with Emergency Reporting, and the information on this page is not endorsed by that organization.