Every medical courier eventually gets the call: the lab says a specimen never arrived. What happens next decides whether you keep the account. StatVault gives that moment a proper record, an incident report built on the evidence the system already holds.
Start with what the record already shows
An incident in StatVault is linked to the orders, drivers, route stops and locations involved. That means the investigation starts from evidence, not memory: the chain of custody timeline for the order, the NFC tap at the box or its absence, the driver's position at the stop, photos, signatures, and any temperature readings from a SmartBox or a cooler thermometer.
StatVault records evidence and points out gaps. It does not guess who has the specimen. When something is missing from the record, the incident says so.
One record for the whole investigation
Each incident carries:
- A type and a severity. Missing specimen, loose specimen, specimen handling, cold chain, chain of custody, late delivery, driver issue, vehicle issue, coverage gap, client complaint.
- Evidence. Notes, uploaded photos and documents, and messages attached from Slack, kept with the incident.
- Open questions. Who last had the box? Was the dock door locked? Each question stays open until someone answers it, and the list shows how many are still open.
- Linked orders, drivers and places. The order, the driver, the stop, the location and the customer are attached to the incident.
- A timeline. Everything that happened on the incident, in order.
Who was told, and when
Hospitals and labs have their own reporting duties, and they will ask when you told them. Disclosure is tracked on its own: each entry records who was told and what was communicated. An incident can be resolved and still show exactly when the client heard about it.
Close it with what you learned
Closing an incident asks one more question: should this change how the fleet works? You can send a fleet memo, put a watch on a location or a driver, or add a note that dispatch will see the next time that site comes up. If nothing needs to change, you say so and close it.
Ask Zippy
Zippy can open an incident from a sentence, link the order, add a question, log a disclosure and draft the fleet memo for you to edit. Ask it for the open incidents this week and it lists them.
How it fits
Incident reports sit on top of the custody record that every order already carries. The better the proof at the box, the shorter the investigation. See chain of custody and NFC proof of pickup.
Related
Further reading: Incidents.
Questions couriers ask
- What is a courier incident report?
- A record of something that went wrong and needs an answer: a missing specimen, a cold chain break, a chain of custody question, a late delivery or a client complaint. It holds the description, the evidence, the people and orders involved, and a timeline.
- What kinds of incident can I record?
- Specimen handling, missing specimen, loose specimen, cold chain, chain of custody, late delivery, driver issue, vehicle issue, coverage gap, client complaint and other.
- Can I show a lab that we told them?
- Yes. Each incident has a disclosure log that records who was told and what was said, separate from the incident's status.
- Where does the evidence come from?
- From the order's own custody record, plus notes, uploaded photos and documents, and messages attached from Slack.
- What happens when an incident is closed?
- You record the resolution and, if it should change how the fleet works, send a fleet memo, put a watch on a location or a driver, or add a note that future dispatch will see.