Understanding Incident Notifications

Understanding the available incident notification channels in Squadcast

When an incident is assigned to on-call users, they receive incident notifications. These notifications are triggered or escalated when an incident occurs and can be delivered through various channels such as Push notifications, Email, SMS, and Phone calls.

It's important to note that these notifications are specifically generated for incidents created within Squadcast and cannot be created manually.

Note: You can also choose to be notified of incidents via Slack and Google Chat.

Prerequisites

  1. To begin receiving Push notifications, it is essential for all users to verify their phone numbers. Additionally, we highly recommend ensuring that the Squadcast mobile app on your device is regularly updated.

  2. In order to begin receiving email notifications, it is necessary for all users to verify their email addresses.

  3. To ensure receipt of SMS and Phone call notifications for incidents, users need to complete the following steps:

    1. Verify the phone number associated with their Profile.

    2. Enable SMS and Phone call notifications for the Organization.

Notification Phone Numbers

Squadcast phone and SMS notifications can come from varying numbers based on your country and other variables.

Phone Call Notifications
  1. +17076844278

  2. +17072447799

SMS Notifications
  1. +17076844278

  2. +17072447799

Notification Details and Logs

To access the Notification Logs for a specific incident, follow these steps:

  1. Go to the Incident Details page.

  2. In the Responders section, locate and click on Notification Logs.

  3. The Notification Logs will provide you with information about the source of each incident notification.

Notification Logs for an incident in Squadcast
Notification Logs for an incident

The Notification Logs include:

  1. Cause: Indicates the cause of the notification, such as:

    1. Incident Alert: Notifications are sent out for incidents triggered.

    2. Acknowledgment Reminder Alerts: Reminder notifications are sent out for unresolved incidents (if set up in the Escalation Policy).

    3. Incident Watcher Notification: Email notifications are sent out when a user/squad has subscribed to watch the incident

    4. @mentions: Email and Push notifications are sent out when a user/squad is @mentioned in the Notes section for the incident.

  2. Name: User to whom the notification has been sent

  3. Channel: Indicates the notification channel followed by the destination.

  4. Status: Indicated the status of the notification, such as:

    1. scheduled: When the notification is scheduled to be sent out from Squadcast.

    2. dispatched: When the notification is dispatched from Squadcast and has been accepted by our providers for further delivery.

    3. sent: When the notification is dispatched from the providers’ platform to the user.

    4. delivered: When the notification has been delivered successfully to the user.

    5. canceled: When an incident has been acknowledged or resolved, the rest of the scheduled notifications will not be dispatched. The notification status of these notifications will be set to cancel.

    6. failed: When Squadcast is unable to send out the notification.

  5. Time: Indicates the time at which the notification was sent (or is yet to be sent).

You can filter the notification logs based on the Causes, Type, and Status of the notification.

Note: To export the Notification Logs for an incident in .CSV format, click on the download icon next to the refresh icon on the top.

More on push notifications:

  1. You might see multiple push notifications being scheduled/dispatched if you have logged in to your Squadcast account on multiple mobile devices

  2. You will not see any push notifications in the logs if you have not installed and logged into the Squadcast mobile app even though you have push as a notification channel in your notification rule(s).

Permission for Push Notifications

Please verify if the necessary permissions for Push Notifications have been granted.

To ensure you receive regular notifications and bypass the Do Not Disturb (DND) feature, please follow these instructions:

  1. Granting permissions for regular notifications:

    • During the onboarding process of the mobile app, you will have the option to grant permissions for regular notifications. Please make sure to enable this feature.

    • Alternatively, you can navigate to the Settings menu on your device.

    • Locate and select App and Notifications

    • Look for the Squadcast app and select Notifications

    • Toggle the switch for all the types of notifications you wish to receive.

  2. Bypassing Do Not Disturb:

    • Follow the steps provided here to bypass the Do Not Disturb setting.

Note: We send push notifications for the following:

  • Incident notifications

  • On-Call Reminder notifications

  • @mentions in Incident Notes

Bypass Do Not Disturb (DND) for SMS and Phone Call Notifications

Bypassing Do Not Disturb is a powerful feature to receive Push, SMS, and Phone call notifications for incidents even when your phone has the Do Not Disturb mode turned on.

Download the Squadcast vCard to create a contact for Squadcast, then follow the instructions below for mobile devices running on either Android or iOS.

Android

To ensure uninterrupted SMS and phone call incident notifications on your Android device, follow these steps after downloading the vCard and creating a Squadcast contact:

  1. Create a Squadcast contact using the downloaded vCard.

  1. Star the Squadcast contact.

  2. Go to Settings and locate the section for configuring Apps & Notifications or Sounds (the exact location may vary depending on your device).

  3. In our example device, access the Do Not Disturb section.

  4. Open the Exceptions settings and allow notifications for the starred Squadcast contact, even when Do Not Disturb mode is enabled.

By completing these steps, your Android device will continue to receive SMS and phone call incident notifications, even when in Do Not Disturb mode.

iOS

To ensure uninterrupted SMS and phone call incident notifications on your iOS device, follow these steps after downloading the vCard and creating a Squadcast contact:

  1. Launch the Contacts app and locate the Squadcast contact. Tap on it to open the contact details.

  1. Scroll down until you find the entries for Ringtone and Text Tone. Tap on either Ringtone or Text Tone, whichever you prefer to configure.

  2. At the top of the menu, you will see an option for Emergency Bypass. Toggle it on for each of the desired notification methods for this contact.

By following these steps, even if your iOS device is in Do Not Disturb mode, you will continue to receive SMS and phone call incident notifications without any interruptions.

Bypass Do Not Disturb (DND) for Push Notifications

Users can choose to override the DND settings on their mobile phones and receive critical incident notifications from Squadcast via Push.

Android

On an Android device, follow the steps as indicated below:

  1. Navigate to My Profile -> Toggle Allow DND Access

  2. Next, you'll be navigated to this screen in settings -> Toggle Override Do Not Disturb on.

Note:

To override DND Mode on Samsung and Redmi devices,

  1. Navigate to the Do Not Disturb settings screen in your device’s Settings App

  2. Add Squadcast to your Device’s DND exceptions

iOS

To override DND Mode for Squadcast Push Notifications, you will have to add Squadcast to your DND exceptions in your device's Settings App.

Refer to the flow as shown in the images below.

Custom Notification Sounds (iOS)

To customize the push notification sounds for your iOS device,

  1. Navigate to My Profile -> Alert Settings -> Push Notification Sounds

  2. You can choose notification sounds for Incident Alerts and Other Notifications (On-Call Reminders and Notes @mentions) from the list of available sounds.

Image. Customize Notification Sounds
Image. Select Custom Sound

Note:

  1. The notification sound you select is device-specific. This means you can customize notification sounds for individual devices you're logged into.

  2. Please note that if you uninstall the app or clear its data, your notification sound will be reset to the default tone.

  3. This functionality has been introduced in iOS app version 3.1.0.

Sound Credits: Thanks to the folks at Pixabay, Mixkit, and Freesound for the royalty-free sound effects.

Push Notification Sound and Volume

Push Notification Sound and Volume settings vary for Android and iOS devices:

Android

  1. By default, notifications will play in your device’s default notification sound. To customize Push Notification Sound, follow the steps here.

  2. Squadcast does not override your device’s notification volume. This means that you will receive push notifications at the volume you have set on your device. If your device is on silent or vibrate mode, you won’t hear any sound for Squadcast push notifications. If you’d like to receive Squadcast push notifications at 100% volume on your Android device, you’ll have to set your device’s notification volume to 100%.

iOS

  1. If you’d like Incident Notifications to override your device’s volume, you should enable Critical Alerts for Squadcast. If you don't enable Critical Alerts for Squadcast, you will receive Squadcast Push Notifications at the volume you have set for your device.

Note: When critical alerts are enabled, you’ll receive Incident Notifications at 100% volume, even if your device is on Mute mode or DND Mode (Check out this iOS Doc for more).

Refer to the flow as shown in the images below.

Note: If you don’t want to receive Incident Notifications at 100% volume, you’ll have to disable critical alerts for Squadcast.

Custom Notification Sounds (iOS)

To customize the push notification sounds for your iOS device,

  1. Navigate to My Profile -> Alert Settings -> Push Notification Sounds

  2. You can choose notification sounds for Incident Alerts and Other Notifications (On-Call Reminders and Notes @mentions) from the list of available sounds.

Image. Customize Notification Sounds
Image. Select Custom Sound

Note:

  1. The notification sound you select is device-specific. This means you can customize notification sounds for individual devices you're logged into.

  2. Please note that if you uninstall the app or clear its data, your notification sound will be reset to the default tone.

  3. This functionality has been introduced in iOS app version 3.1.0.

Sound Credits: Thanks to the folks at Pixabay, Mixkit, and Freesound for the royalty-free sound effects.

Supported Countries

We use third-party providers to send out SMS and Phone call incident notifications. SMS and Phone call notifications are supported for all the countries across the world except for:

  • Cuba

  • North Korea

  • Russia (SMS not supported)

  • Kazakhstan (SMS not supported)

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#426: Past Incidents

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