First Due Mobile

I have two concerns regarding this app. 1: how slow it is to open up once you get a notification. 2: the GPS. If you get dispatched to 100 Elm st. The map shows a completely different address that’s close by. Sesame thing when you go to click the button for directions (and it opens up a 3rd party GPS). The second one is the biggest issue for me. As a relief driver, I use this app daily. Instead of using the map, I type in the address once I get the notification.

As a driver, I am really loving this app. As soon as the notification comes in I can quickly pull up the image of the incident and get a look at things like my water situation, FDC locations, and the structure itself. Helps me get a leg up on water and positioning and only takes a few seconds. If I’m heading out of the first due area it also lets me get a quick look at my first few turns, giving my officer some time to get settled and into the map books while I can already be heading down the road as soon as the crew jumps in. The only negative I have for the app is that there is no way to silence the alerts as they come in. I would love to keep the app running on my days off just to keep tabs on what incidents the other shifts are running but the notifications won’t silence and hearing the tones go off on my days off can get old. Even turning sounds off on my phone won’t stop the notification audio from going off. I have to turn off notifications completely in the app settings and then I can’t see what calls come in at all. Just add a no sound option in the tones list, please.

UPDATE: Little improvement since last post. We’ve also noticed that this program is heavily reliant on downloads rather than using the hard drive (the gigabytes of memory available) in the host iPad or tablet. This slows down the App making it a total slog fest. Also, you can’t navigate in the Preplan Map, you have to switch back and forth between the Preplan Map to the Nav Map to see your relative position. LAME! Also, the App is constantly requiring updates, usually when you’re trying to respond to a call, like daily version updates. Clumsy, clunky, glitchy app. Not user friendly, especially while bouncing down the road enroute to a call. The screens are too busy with too many screens within screens (windows) that compete with each other. It doesn’t track other units as well as Incident View or Life 360. It’s slow to download hydrants. It’s a heavy program that requires ideal fast connectivity. You have to completely leave your navigation screen to look at Pre-plans. Way too much button pushing while trying to drive, navigate and get your crew briefed enroute to a call. Your head is buried in the screen the entire drive into the call. Needs to be streamlined.

First Due is what my department chose to go with vs active 911. I’ve had it for a while now, and like what it can do. My problem is I have to wait a few minutes for it to load every time I open it. And now every time I try to open the group message it force closes. There’s always been one bug or another since I’ve had this that keeps it from being as good as it could be. What needs to be done is for it to work lightning fast as soon as you get an alert because we do not have time to wait for things to load. It needs to stop force closing when you try to open something on it. And if y’all ever have the ability too, it would be wonderful to have access to call notes. It shows the first few words of the notes and stops. If you could find a way that it could get the full notes that would be wonderful.

I thought apps were supposed to be user-friendly and efficient when in a palm sized device. This app does work, but it doesn’t work great due to navigation issues and it’s generally all-around clumsy. Looking at calendars where it’s a screen inside of a screen that requires you to drag it around to see within the same week makes me want to jump off a bridge. Doing things like equipment checks where I needlessly have to scroll all the way to an item that I have already clicked on makes me wanna total my own car with me inside of it. It does everything that my old apps did for work, but worse. I’m only using it because my job is now switching to it and I hope the developers see this and make things more streamlined as this app feels like it was created by someone who had never seen a smart phone before.

First Due has changed the way our entire region operates. As a driver, I can look at the first couple turns while heading to the apparatus. From the bucket, it has encompassed situational awareness and the team concept with the ability to see and communicate supplemental incident notes, preplan information, hose stretches and any hazards from the aerial view. From the officer’s standpoint, with just a couple key strokes, they have access to water supply information, strategies, tactics, maps, photos, other units locations, and a wealth of information once reserved for research on the web. The biggest thing that has impacted operations in my 30 year fire service career.

As for the app, it’s completely clumsy, lacks basic UI and just general use features that should be on. Why the heck can’t I just turn off the silent override like other app. Why do I have to fully take my self off dispatches. Why can I not start a simple EMS chart from the app. As for the whole thing, any services looking to go to this “program”, don’t, you and you’re employees will be grateful. This program had no common sense put into it. I’ve used a handful of different software over the past 13 years, and this is by far the worse (and yes, worse then EMS Charts). This feels like a money grab and that’s it. Doing anything on this “program” feels like a punishment. I have a very basic understanding of programming and web / App UI, and I feel like I would be able to spend 1 afternoon and put together something 10x better then is.

While the app has room to improve, this has allowed me to get a clear idea of available hydrants and major cross streets of medical emergencies. While I always verify with my department issued maps, I have had no issues with serviceability or stability, and it has been accurate so far in 3 months of use. As an amateur app developer myself I am aware of the complexities involved in making an app like this, and it may take some time to streamline everything and make it as efficient as it can be, but as for now if you have a solid data connection you should have no issues.

The idea of this app is outstanding, BUT FirstDue’s product team has failed miserably in their execution. This app has all of the information as advertised, but their delivery of this information through this extremely non-user-friendly user interface makes it nearly useless. The absolute worst part of this software is their ePCR, with no improvements in sight from their product team. It’s like jumping back in time to the early 2000’s, sitting at a desktop computer trying to input your paper report, but WORSE. Do NOT buy this software for your department! The only part of it that is somewhat useful is the preplans, still not impressive, but the rest of the things advertised are almost unusable due to the horrendously bad user interface.

Our county is switching over to First Due and I’m not happy at all. The navigation screen is horrendous and slow. Good luck trying to find out the basic details of the incident. You have to scroll through too much to find relevant information. And when you select your incident, you can scroll across the map. It continuously pulls you back to the incident location or your location. Not helpful at all. The icons make no sense either and should be more intuitive. All these are bad when it comes to emergency services/responses. I hope we continue to at least provide Active 911 so there is something familiar and easy to use.

Unfortunately 1 star is the lowest I can go……. Constant updates & multiple issues with this App. In fact, the App is so bad our Department highly recommends that we use a browser instead of the app. I know of at least 20 Departments that purchased this App and they certainly regret it. Most of the Departments using this App don’t use the scheduling part because it’s just that bad. Some Departments prefer paper/pencil or an Excel spreadsheet over this App. A great concept but it appears that they rushed the process & didn’t work out the kinks before bringing it to market. I’m no rocket scientist (or App Developer), but I do know that if I were a Chief of a Department I certainly wouldn’t spend money on this App.

Frequently have to reinstall the app due to it crashing while loading. After latest reinstall and login (multiple attempts at this cycle), I am stuck viewing the details of a seemingly random incident. I can't view the main dashboard with incident history, map, or settings. This means I can't change alert settings or see incident details, making the app absolutely and unequivocally unusable. Devs: this kind of issue should be impossible with adequate automated testing. I can handle the frequent reinstalls (though that should be fixed, too) but this latest issue is completely unacceptable. How did this get past QA?

I spent months developing a system with this program for our department. After an update, many buildings and their extensive associated data went missing. Numerous months have now passed, and the problem remains unfixed. Very disappointing. In the beginning however, I spoke directly with developers who were open to many suggestions, unfortunately the app has become more popular and the one-on-one attention is no longer…

With the new unit tracking and some of the other enhancements. This app continues to impress. We switch from another product to this about a year ago and have had a lot of benefits to the crews when they are responding. The only thing I would like to see is off-line functionality. Keep up the good work!!!

I work for a fire department and this is a new app we use. It is relatively easy to navigate, but it has so many options and it’s unclear for people who are new to it. It’s not very user friendly, but it works. The main problem I’ve encountered is lack it consistency. We are using it for scheduling and as our alerting system when a 911 call comes in. Sometimes I won’t appear on the schedule even though I’m supposed to. The alerts are always late and sometimes I don’t get any notifications at all.

Two major problems. 1. Certain apartment numbers, suite numbers, room numbers, entrance numbers, etc never show in the app. At times these numbers are know to in the notification only but never in the app itself. 2. 3rd party directions. I have screenshots of this app taking me to google maps and then attempting to apply an address to the destination that was a previous call from days ago. This can and has happen to me and my partners on several occasions, at times causing delayed response to the correct address. THIS IS A BIG ISSUE. Otherwise the app is decent, slow at times. But the CAD info is great.

Need to add some additional options. Main thing missing is continuous repaging. Most of the alert tones are too obnoxious to use overnight. Need a vibration option that continues until app is opened. User interface is also a bit cumbersome in the app vs desktop. Department used a competitor before switching over because county mandated…so getting everyone on board has taken a bit of time from an acceptance perspective.

We have been using the app now for nearly a year for a wide range of task. Daily lineup, vacation and holiday picks, calls and responses, and a few other activities. The customization and ease of use are my favorite part of the app.

This app is good. It has a lot of potential. The area that needs the most improvement is for responders who use this app at multiple agencies. The ability to toggle back and forth between 2 or more agencies instead of logging out and back in would be asignificant improvement in the functionality of this app.

Google maps is a great application if you don’t mind being track where you go by google so they can use and sell this information about your movements. Please restore ability to use Apple Maps which does not sell or use info for marketing purposes. Call information is buried in blurb as it has been for months with attempt to post process clean it up.

It works well but it would be nice if it had an option to allow us to schedule the notifications to turn on and off with our shift schedule. So notifications on for 24 hours, then off for 48 automatically.

My times of dispatch are incorrect. They are all an hour behind. I don’t know if it’s something on my end but I have looked through all the setting to try and fix. Also I would like to change the time between military time and standard time

My department uses it alot, we dont get many problems from it. Only issue is every now and then it takes a few minutes for a call to come across. But its usually pretty fast. Its definitely gotten better since we first started using it

This app has propelled our organization to the next level of pre-planning and fire inspections. The app stays updated and their support team is responsive. There are so many incredible features packed into this tool.

Clicking on a notification for an event should not just open the app, it should open up the event so you can access the info that much quicker. The app used to do this, but I guess one of the updates ruin it. App can be very laggy sometimes too.

Only platform that truly solved our pre-incident planning and response issues. We went from no information to data on every structure from day 1. Excited for what’s next!!!

There is no way to control the call notifications and turn them off without also turning off callshift notifications and other messages. I don’t want to have my phone going off for every call when I am off-duty. There need to be more options to control individual notifications of each group instead of the current “one size fits all”.

I really like this app, as it provides live updates. I wish you could sort responses on the call screen, so the people responding to station are grouped together, and then people going to scene are grouped together. Other apps do that and it’s very helpful. I also wish you could create custom position titles.

This app alerts us up to 30 seconds before our CAD system does. Always reliable and easy to use and to change settings

For a while now my app has frozen whenever trying to turn notifications off for my days off. Can this please be fixed? I’ve been hopeful with each update but the problem remains the same. Also the same for coworkers.

The app overall is great. However the calendar for the schedule is horrible. Take a look at what When2Work did and how they fit everything on smaller devices. It’s something that can be done. Kinda think that the whole world schedule needs an overhaul.

Really solid app. Only issue is I have 2 jurisdictions I work for who both use it so I have to constantly log out and in between them. They need a quick way to merge them or be able to switch easily

As a driver this app is awesome. I can quickly open as soon as the call comes in and see the structure or area we are responding to. We also use it during preplans to set up the building and all info needed for that building.

The app itself is pretty good. However, at least once weekly, I have to delete and redownload the app because it will continuously crash and becomes unusable.

This is a good app for emergency personnel. One option I wish it had was a search feature to be able to find a certain event type quickly

The app has come a long ways from the beginning. The current 3.1 rating does not give it justice.

I love the app as a driver. The info we get for hydrants is super helpful. The thing I don’t like is that every time a call comes through, the app freezes for several seconds before all the CAD info populates. I have made every adjustment suggested and it still happens. Please fix this!

The application is very useful in everyday use. However in the last update. The scheduling feature became inoperable

Selected that I only want notifications for specific vehicles and it doesn’t work at all. Will just get random notifications that often don’t pertain to the notification settings, making the app pretty useless.

There’s no way to silence notifications. You allegedly can in the settings…doesn’t work so don’t bother wasting your time. Not to mention if blocks music, phones calls, videos, etc anytime there’s a notification so have fun getting your days off not even off as your will constantly be bombarded with notifications.

I have had this app going on two months. At first it worked great now after a while it takes forever for the app to load and sometimes it won’t even open. Thankfully we still use Active911 so I just open it and use it. Absolutely frustrating.

I cannot log out of this app when I’m off duty. It keeps telling me to try again later. I have to uninstall and reinstall to log out. Very frustrating. It should also allow me to customize the notifications so that it automatically turns them off when I’m off shift.

You have to stay logged in for the notification settings to stay. Once you logout, the notification sounds reset to default.

App was working great but now has a bug. I have all calls turned off but still receiving other calls. It is irritating. Please fix

They desperately need to rework the mobile app. By the looks of it they’ve gotten MULTIPLE complaints about this over the years and have not fixed it. The very poor user interface leads to very poor documentation. Make the app more user friendly and people naturally document better.

Can you guys do a Iwatch app so we can get alerts when not connected to our phones?

I work and volunteer at multiple agencies that use FirstDue. Would be very nice if you could have multiple logins at once, or at least be able to store multiple accounts, such as Active911

iOS Shortcuts App has no access to First Due. Massive missed opportunity from the developers here. It would be a wonderful thing to be able to control smart lighting and devices based off a FD notification.

The app is not well designed. Its easy to fumble around looking for different buttons and click the wrong ones. The 360 degree building view is all messed up, barely visible. This app needs a serious overall. Don’t bother until it is better designed and optimized for Mobile

Ver. 4.4.4 downloaded and installed on iPhone 12 will not open. Screen goes white with app logo in center for 1 second then closes. Deleted app, rebooted phone, downloaded and installed and retried with same results. No bug or crash report could be found