Staff assigned the Responder role receive emergency alerts through the Rescue Mobile app the moment an emergency is declared. For notifications to work reliably, a few things need to be in place before an incident occurs.

Enable notifications on your phone

Emergency push notifications are delivered as critical alerts, which will sound and display even if your phone is on Do Not Disturb. For this to work, notifications must be enabled at the system level.

On iPhone: go to Settings > Notifications > Rescue and confirm notifications are set to Allow.

If the app is not installed, notifications cannot be delivered. Make sure every staff member who should receive alerts has the app installed and notifications enabled before their first shift.

Confirm your role in the dashboard

Emergency notifications are delivered based on your assigned role.

• Responder — receives push notifications, SMS, and email when an emergency is declared
• User — does not receive emergency notifications by default; can receive device health monitoring alerts
• Admin — can receive device health monitoring alerts; emergency notification delivery depends on whether Admin also has Responder privileges

To confirm your role: log into app.punchrescue.com, go to Users, and click your name. If your role needs to be updated, an administrator can change it from the same page.

If your organization uses STOPit Notify, who receives emergency notifications is controlled by your Notify configuration, rather than the Responder role in the Rescue dashboard. Confirm your responder assignment is correct in the STOPit Notify admin console.

Confirm your phone number can receive texts

SMS alerts are sent to the mobile number saved in your Rescue profile. Go to your profile in the app and confirm the number on file is a personal mobile number that can receive text messages.

What you see during an active emergency

When an emergency is declared, Responders receive a push notification with the emergency category and location. Tapping the notification opens the app directly to the active emergency. From there you can:

• View the emergency category, triggering device, and time of alert
• See the staff member's location on the 3D map (for Card-triggered emergencies)
• Resolve the emergency once the situation is handled

For non-K-12 organizations with 911 Alert active: a 30-second validation window appears in the app when a Level 2 emergency is declared. Tap Confirm to dispatch 911, or Cancel to stand down. If the window is ignored, the system escalates automatically through SMS, IVR, and a monitoring center call before dispatching.

Resolving an emergency from the app

Tap Resolve Emergency on the active emergency screen and confirm. This sends a reset signal to your hardware — Alert Station alarms stop, Repeater strobes turn off, and the event is logged with a resolution timestamp.

If you use STOPit Notify, resolve the emergency in the Notify app first.