When someone says they need help, a distress case opens automatically, captures where they are and what they need, sets a priority, and lets an operator respond by text or escalate to a call.
When a Distress Case Opens
The moment somebody says they need help — or that they can't respond — a distress case opens automatically. It turns a worrying answer into something you can actually work: a single, traceable thread for that one person, sitting on the incident's Response tab ready for an operator.
From the response page — Tapping "Need help" or "Can't respond" opens a case straight away, before they've finished the rest of the form.
From a text reply — Replying NO to an "Are you safe?" alert, or texting the number to say they're not safe, does the same.
From the app — A member raising distress in-app lands in the same queue.
What You Already Know
Where the person used the response page, the case arrives with their location, their answers to your questions, and often a priority already set from what they chose — nothing had to be asked twice. Where they came in by text, whoot. gathers the essentials by SMS so no time is lost:
It asks where they are — building, floor or nearest landmark.
It asks how they need help — injured, trapped, medical, unsafe.
It reads their answers, sets a priority from the words they use, and confirms the team can see their messages.
Auto-triage can be switched off for your organisation in Settings → General if you'd rather operators lead every conversation by hand. With it on, the location and need are usually captured before anyone is free to respond.
Priority
Immediate — Life-threatening wording (trapped, injured, fire, weapon and the like) pushes the case to the top.
Urgent — Needs help, but not flagged life-threatening.
Standby — Logged and watched.
Unknown — Not yet triaged.
Responding
Acknowledge — Mark that the case is seen.
Claim — Take ownership so the team knows it's yours.
Reply — Text the person directly, one to one, from the case.
Set priority — Override the automatic priority if you know better.
Show on map — Jump straight to that person's pin.
Resolve — Close the case once they're safe or handed off.
Call — Escalate straight to a phone call.
Escalating to a Call
When texting isn't enough, Call dials the person from the room's own number — so the caller ID is one they'll recognise — and drops you into a voice channel with them. The call is recorded and transcribed like any other, so it lands in the incident record automatically.
Safety Reversal & Reopening
Safety reversal — If someone said they were safe and then says they're not, the case is flagged so that swing from safe to unsafe is impossible to miss.
Reopen on reply — If a resolved case gets another message from that person, it reopens itself and re-alerts the whole team — because a closed case is no reason to stop listening.
Silence on a live stream — If somebody with an open case was sharing live location and that stream goes quiet, whoot. texts them. A pocketed phone and an unconscious person look identical on a map; SMS is the channel that survives the first one.
Distress is life-safety, so the dashboard doesn't trust the live connection alone — it also refreshes on a short timer and re-alerts every operator when a case reopens. Nothing waits on a single notification getting through.