New in Field Services · Animal control
AnimalsFirst Field Services now has three new screens. A live Dispatch board for the people who send officers out. A Calendar of scheduled visits, so no recheck is missed. And a Management Dashboard for the people who answer for the numbers.
Drawn from the real screen, with sample data. Watch the first officer: when the Check In countdown hits zero the box turns red. Press Check In to clear it.
In plain words
AnimalsFirst Field Services is animal control dispatch software. It is the field services module of AnimalsFirst, the cloud shelter management platform built for animal shelters, humane societies, and city and county animal care and control agencies. It runs in a web browser on a desk computer, a tablet or a phone. There is nothing to install.
It has three screens. The Dispatch board shows every open call and every officer on one live page. The Calendar holds scheduled visits such as rechecks, trap pickups and court dates. The Management Dashboard reports cases opened, cases closed, days to close, busy hours, time by officer, and work by ZIP code and jurisdiction.
Field service cases live in the same AnimalsFirst account as intake, adoptions, fosters, medical records, TNVR and donations, so a case links to the animal and the people already on file.
The life of a call
Officers press one button at each step. The board shows where everyone is. The case keeps the record.
A new case lands in the Unassigned queue on the board.
The dispatcher picks a lead officer. Other officers can join to assist.
Start opens that officer's own clock for the drive out.
Arrived stamps the time. The Check-In countdown begins.
Taking an animal to the shelter. The clock keeps running.
The clock closes. The time is filed in the case's Working Log.
Filled dots are steps where the officer's clock is running. En Route and Check-In can be switched on or off for each shelter.
Dispatch board
For dispatchers and Field Services supervisors
One screen replaces the whiteboard, the radio log and the sticky notes. It refreshes on its own every two minutes.
| Action | Case # | Call Date | Case Type | Status | Priority |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Assign | 4833 | 09/17/2026 10:05 AM | Injured Wildlife | New | 1 - Emergency |
| Assign | 4834 | 09/17/2026 10:11 AM | Bite Report | New | 2 - Urgent |
| Assign | 4831 | 09/17/2026 9:51 AM | Welfare Check | Awaiting Recheck | 3 - Routine |
| Assign | 4829 | 09/17/2026 9:20 AM | Barking Complaint | New | 4 - Low |
1420 Alder St · Working
Reporting party: M. Torres · (615) 555-0142 Animals: Brown dog, tan mixed breedScreens drawn from the real components, with sample data.
Active Cases, Unassigned, In Service and Out of Service sit at the top of the board.
Each officer shows a status badge, a running clock, the case they are on, and their next case. Drag boxes to reorder the board.
En Route, Arrived, Start transport, Clear. Each press stamps the time and changes the badge color.
Put several officers on one case. One leads, the others assist. Each officer has their own clock.
A countdown runs while an officer is on scene. When a Check In is due, the box turns red and blinks, and the board checks again every five seconds.
Filter by priority, case type, jurisdiction or status. Assign an officer without leaving the board.
Pins for working, current, next, Check In due and unassigned cases. Each pin opens a card with the caller, the animals and the officers on the case. Filter by officer, case type, status, priority or jurisdiction.
Open any officer's list and drag rows to set the order. Spot 1 is the current case. Spot 2 is the next case.
Every case keeps the record: officer, started, arrived, left scene, ended, and the time per officer.
A new call comes in while you are on the board. Press Add Case, file it, and you land back on the board with the case in the queue.
One click hides the officers who are off duty. The count stays in the tooltip, and one more click brings them back.
When an action is not allowed, the board says why. "Clear this officer before removing them from the case." "Pick who leads the case before removing the current lead."
Scheduled visits · Calendar
For officers, dispatchers and Field Services supervisors
A recheck, a court date, a trap pickup. Schedule it on the case and it shows up in three places: the calendar, the officer's route, and the case itself. When the time passes, it turns red on its own.
| # | Case | Address | Status | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 4821 - Stray Visit due | 1420 Alder St | Working | |
| 2 | 4822 - Welfare Check | 88 Mill Rd | Assigned | |
| 3 | 4818 - Neglect Overdue | 210 Ridge Rd | Awaiting Recheck | |
| 4 | 4835 - Bite Report | 5 Harbor Ln | Assigned |
Drag rows to set the order the officer will visit each case. Map pins show the same numbers.
Arrived on scene at 1420 Alder St. En Route took 21 minutes.
Started working the case. En Route with Kim Brooks assisting.
Owner not home. Left a door hanger. Neighbor says the dog is usually tied out in the back yard.
Recheck set for tomorrow, 2:30 PM.
Completed the scheduled visit. Dog present, water and shade in place. Owner given 7 days to fix the fence.
Screens drawn from the real components, with sample data. Today is 09/22/2026 in the sample.
Add a note, pick a date in the future, and it is saved as a scheduled visit. Choose the visit type and the officers. It appears on the calendar at once.
Filter by officer or visit type, or show only your own visits. Drag a visit to move it. On a phone, the calendar opens as a list.
A visit whose time has passed and is not complete turns red on the calendar, on the case and on the officer's page. Nobody has to mark it.
A visit that is due puts the case on the officer's list for the day, with a Visit due or Overdue badge. Even when the officer is not assigned to that case.
Completing a visit writes the activity into the case timeline. A canceled visit stays on the calendar, grayed out, with the reason.
If a case still has scheduled visits, the app lists them before you close it. The visits stay as they are.
Notes, dispatch stamps and completed visits in one list, newest or oldest first. Filter by type. Reply to any entry.
Every case shows its next visit under the title. Click it to complete, edit or cancel. The Activities tab counts the overdue ones in red.
Each En Route, Arrived and Clear press can write itself into the case timeline. Switch this on or off for your shelter.
Management Dashboard
For Field Services managers, shelter executives and contract owners
Pick any date range. The page answers three questions: how much work came in, how much got finished, and how long it took.
| Priority | Closed | Median days | 90% within |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 - Emergency | 96 | 0.4 | 2 |
| 2 - Urgent | 233 | 1.2 | 5 |
| 3 - Routine | 601 | 2.9 | 11 |
| 4 - Low | 118 | 4.6 | 19 |
| Unknown | 10 | 3.1 | 14 |
| Case type | Closed | Median days | 90% within |
|---|---|---|---|
| Stray | 318 | 1.6 | 6 |
| Welfare Check | 190 | 3.1 | 12 |
| Barking Complaint | 128 | 5.2 | 21 |
| Bite Report | 101 | 2.2 | 9 |
| Injured Wildlife | 90 | 0.5 | 2 |
| Officer | Sessions | Cases | En Route | On Scene | Transport | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dana Alvarez | 118 | 94 | 21:40 | 66:12 | 9:05 | 96:57 |
| Kim Brooks | 97 | 81 | 18:02 | 51:30 | 6:48 | 76:20 |
| Marcus Chen | 104 | 88 | 24:15 | 49:03 | 11:20 | 84:38 |
| Riya Patel | 89 | 70 | 16:44 | 58:21 | 4:12 | 79:17 |
| Sam Okafor | 112 | 92 | 22:08 | 44:50 | 17:36 | 84:34 |
| Jo Rivera | 92 | 79 | 19:30 | 47:14 | 7:02 | 73:46 |
| Total | 612 | 122:19 | 317:10 | 56:03 | 495:32 |
0 to 7 days
171
8 to 30 days
118
31 to 90 days
61
Over 90 days
21
| 3310 | Hoarding | 3 - Routine | D. Alvarez | 04/29/2026 | 141 days |
| 3587 | Dangerous Dog | 2 - Urgent | R. Patel | 05/22/2026 | 118 days |
| 3702 | Neglect | 3 - Routine | Unassigned | 06/12/2026 | 97 days |
Screen drawn from the real components, with sample data. Every card on the real page is shown.
Today through Last 12 months, or a custom range. Compare to the previous period or the same period last year. Every headline number shows the change.
Cases opened, cases closed, open at the end of the period, and median days to close. Each has a small trend line.
Side-by-side bars with the backlog charted below. When closed keeps up with opened, the team is keeping up.
A grid of day of week by hour of day. Darker means more calls. This is the staffing chart.
Break cases down by case type, sub type, priority, source, jurisdiction, reporter type, status or resolution.
The normal case and the slow case, side by side. Plus every open case by age, and a list of the oldest ones.
Cases by ZIP code and by jurisdiction.
Cleared visits per officer: En Route, On Scene, Transport and Total. A workload view, not a ranking. Click a name to open that officer's visits.
The same time table sits on each officer's staff profile, with its own date range and an export to a spreadsheet.
A short range steps by hour. A long one steps by week, month or year. The card says which.
Officer, case type, priority and jurisdiction apply to the whole page at once.
Download the page as a PDF. Or copy the link: the date range and compare choice travel with it.
Built to be quoted
Leaders repeat these numbers in budget meetings and contract reviews. So each one has a fixed meaning, and shows its work.
n = 1,234 casesYou always see how many cases sit behind a chart. A small "i" on each card says what the number means.
median · 90%A few very old cases can wreck an average. The page shows the median first, then the number of days that nine in ten cases closed within.
opened ≠ closed ≠ openA case opened in March and closed in April counts as opened in March and closed in April. The backlog is its own number.
UnknownCases with no priority or no jurisdiction get an "Unknown" group. Nothing quietly drops out of a total.
shelter time zoneDays and hours are grouped in the shelter's own time zone.
2001 → todayImported cases from an older system count too. We tested it on 222,000 cases across 25 years. Cards load in milliseconds.
Who it is for
Sees the backlog, the slow cases, the busy hours, and who is on what right now.
Sees trends and year-over-year change. Animal control work is seasonal, so last year is the fair comparison.
Sees case volume by ZIP code and jurisdiction, and how long cases take to close, by priority.
Questions people ask
AnimalsFirst Field Services is animal control dispatch software. It is the field services module of AnimalsFirst, a cloud shelter management platform for animal shelters, humane societies and city and county animal care and control agencies. It has three screens: a live Dispatch board, a Calendar of scheduled visits, and a Management Dashboard. It runs in a web browser, so there is nothing to install.
Dispatchers and animal control officers use the Dispatch board and the Calendar every day. Field services supervisors use them to see who is where. Shelter executives and city or county contract owners use the Management Dashboard for case counts, days to close, and work by ZIP code and jurisdiction.
Four live counts at the top: Active Cases, Unassigned, In Service and Out of Service. A box for each officer with a status badge, a running clock, the current case and the next case. A queue of unassigned cases you can filter and assign without leaving the board. A map with pins for working, current, next, Check In due and unassigned cases. The board refreshes on its own every two minutes.
When an officer presses Arrived, a Check-In countdown starts. If the countdown reaches zero, the officer box turns red and blinks, and the board checks again every five seconds. Pressing Check In resets the timer. En Route and Check-In can be switched on or off for each shelter.
Yes. From the case, add a note, pick a future date, choose the visit type and the officers, and it is saved as a scheduled visit. It shows on the calendar in month, week, day or list view, on the officer's route for that day, and on the case itself. A visit whose time has passed and is not complete turns red on its own. You can complete, edit or cancel a visit. Completing it writes the activity into the case timeline.
Yes. Every case keeps a Working Log with the officer, started, arrived, left scene and ended times. The Management Dashboard has a Time by officer table with En Route, On Scene, Transport and Total time for cleared visits. The same table sits on each officer's staff profile with its own date range and an export to a spreadsheet.
Pick any date range and compare it to the previous period or the same period last year. The page shows cases opened, cases closed, open cases at the end of the period, and median days to close, each with a trend line. Then: opened against closed with the backlog, a busy times grid by day of week and hour, case mix, resolution mix, days to close by priority and by case type (median and 90 percent), aging of open cases with the oldest ones listed, time by officer, and cases by ZIP code and jurisdiction. You can download the page as a PDF or copy a link that carries the date range.
Yes. Cases are counted by ZIP code and by jurisdiction, and days to close are shown by priority. Every card shows how many cases sit behind it. Cases with no priority or jurisdiction are shown in an Unknown group, so nothing drops out of a total. Days and hours are grouped in the shelter's own time zone.
Yes. Imported cases count in every report, from 2001 to today. We tested the Management Dashboard on 222,000 cases across 25 years. Cards load in milliseconds.
Yes. Field service cases live in the same AnimalsFirst account as intake, adoptions, fosters, medical records, TNVR, donations and community support, so a case links to the animal and the people already on file. AnimalsFirst is cloud based and works on a desk computer, a tablet or a phone.
Book a demo at animalsfirst.com/demo. We walk through the Dispatch board, the Calendar and the Management Dashboard on real screens. Or email [email protected].