Read and act on safety signals

What a safety signal is

A safety signal is an answer that describes a risk to someone's safety: self-harm, violence or threats, sexual harassment or abuse, harassment or discrimination, a safety incident, an injury from a product, or fraud. Polzy reads each answer when it is submitted, with a word list and, where AI is on, with AI.

Signals go to the reviewers you name in Settings → Safety signals. The writer, everyone in their reporting line and anyone the answer names are kept from a signal. Until you name reviewers, the owner and every admin read them. When that leaves nobody, your deputy reads it, and failing that the account owner, wherever they are in the writer's line, unless they are the writer's direct manager.

The inbox

Open Safety signals in the menu. Cards at the top say how many critical signals are waiting — Review now opens the first — and, for admins, when only one reviewer is named.

The tabs split the list: Open (waiting or picked up), Confirmed, Closed (dismissed or closed) and All. Search finds a case by its reference, such as S-7Q2M, in any tab. Filter by severity and category.

Each row shows the category and reference, whether the person agreed to be contacted by name, whether there is a conversation or a task, the severity, the status, when to pick it up, and the survey with the day.

When to pick a signal up

• Critical: pick it up within the hour, or your deputy is told, then the owner.
• High: pick it up by the next business day, or your deputy is told, then the owner.
• Medium: in the daily digest.
• Overdue is shown in red once the time has passed.

Polzy only ever shows a day, never a time: the hour an answer arrived could tell you who wrote it.

Inside a signal

The panel shows who found it, the respondent as far as you may know them, who picked it up, and the survey. Below is the question and the answer itself, and whether the survey page showed them the support lines.

• Rest of the response shows the person's other answers, leaving out those that identify them. Opening it is recorded.
• Restricted task creates an urgent task only its assignee and the reviewers can see. Describe it in your own words.
• History lists each step with the day and who took it.

Use Acknowledge to pick it up, Confirm risk when it is real, and Dismiss with a reason when it is not.

Replying to the person

You can only write to someone who asked to be contacted. If they agreed to be contacted by name, choose the channel in the message box: Email, SMS, WhatsApp or Slack, where they can be reached. If they stayed anonymous, your reply goes to their private page, and they quote their reference.