Joining Your Department

Command Established keeps a nationwide directory of fire departments, so a new member can find their department at signup and ask to join it without tracking down the chief first. Administrators review those requests from the members page, or skip the review entirely by sharing an invite link. And if nobody from your department is here yet, the first person to sign up can set it up and become the owner.

This guide covers each of those paths.

I'm a new member and my department already uses Command Established

You don't need anyone to send you anything. Sign up, pick your department, and an administrator gets a request to approve. (If your department is on the platform but hasn't been linked to its directory entry yet, the request goes to our team instead, and we'll route it to your department.)

Go to commandestablished.com/signup. The first screen is Find your fire department.
Start typing your department's name or city. Adding your state narrows it down — for example, sewanee tn.
Select your department from the results. Each result shows the city and state (and the county, when the directory has it) so you can tell same-named departments apart.
Create your account: name, email, and an optional phone number (or sign up with Google).
Verify your email using the code we send you, and choose your password on the same screen. (If you signed up with Google, this step is skipped — your Google account already proves the address.)

Once your email is verified, your join request goes to your department's administrators automatically. Before that, while you're still on the account form, a banner reading Joining [department] · City, ST shows what you picked; select Change if it's the wrong one.

You can also select Skip for now on the department step and find your department later from the Join your department page you land on after signing in.

What happens next

Your department's Owners and Admins get a notification that you asked to join.
When an administrator approves you, you get an email titled You've been added to [department] with a link to open it. Sign in and you're on the roster as a Member.
If an administrator can't verify you, you get a softer email saying they couldn't confirm your membership from the request. The fastest fix is to ask your chief or an administrator directly — they can invite you from the members page.

While you wait, signing in takes you to the Join your department page, where Your requests lists each request with its status. A request that is never acted on expires after 30 days, though it may keep showing in the list — and stay approvable from the department's side — for a while after that before it disappears.

Tip: Directory search and join requests are built so that nobody can use them to figure out which departments are customers. You'll get the same "Request sent" confirmation whether or not your department has an account yet (only a later approval or denial email tells you it does), so if nothing happens for a while, ask your chief whether the department is actually on Command Established.

I'm a chief or administrator — approving and denying requests

Join requests appear on the members page (open Manage > Accounts in the sidebar). Owners and Admins see a Join requests section listing each requester's name, email, and when they asked.

Approve adds the person as a Member immediately. They get the "You've been added" email, and they appear in the members table right away.
Deny asks you to confirm, then sends the requester the soft "couldn't verify your membership" email. Denying can't be undone, but you can always invite that person later.

A new member starts with the Member role and no extra permissions. If they need to write incident reports or edit records, add them to a group or grant permissions as described in Understanding Permissions & Groups.

Invite links

An invite link lets you skip the approval step for a group of people at once — post it in your department's group chat, and everyone who signs up through it joins automatically. Only Owners and Admins can manage invite links.

Open the members page (Manage > Accounts).
In the Invite links section, select New invite link.
Select Copy next to the link and paste it wherever your members will see it.

Each link expires 7 days after it is created. The table shows how many times each link has been used and when it expires. A department can have up to 10 active links at a time; revoke one before creating more if you hit that limit.

What the person on the other end sees

Someone who opens the link lands on the signup page with a note that they've been invited to join your department. They create an account (the department step is skipped), verify their email — or sign up with Google, which skips the code — and they're in. Someone who already has a Command Established account can select Log in to join instead.

Everyone who joins through a link starts as a plain Member — there is no way to grant a higher role through a link. You get a notification each time someone joins, so you can review new arrivals and adjust their permissions.

Revoke a link

Select Revoke next to the link and confirm. The link stops working immediately. Anyone who already joined stays a member; deactivate them from the members list if they shouldn't be there.

Creating and revoking links, and every join through one, shows up in the activity log. The link itself is never recorded there.

I'm the first person from my department

If nobody from your department has an account yet, you can set it up yourself and become its owner.

If you typed a name the directory didn't have

When you sign up and type a department name that isn't in the directory, choose Continue with "[what you typed]". After you verify your email, the Join your department page leads with You're the first from [department]. Select Set up [department], and the create form opens with the name filled in. Add your station address, submit, and you're the owner.

You'll land on a welcome page explaining the trial and how to reach us, and a getting-started card stays on your dashboard until you dismiss it.

If you picked your department from the directory

Select Create your department on the Join your department page (or go to Create Department and find it in the directory picker). The directory pre-fills the department details; you add the street address.

If it turns out someone from your department already set it up, you'll see Looks like your team's here. Select Ask to join to send a join request instead of creating a duplicate.

If you can't find it in the directory at all

On the Create Department page, select Can't find your department? Enter it manually and fill in the details yourself. The department is normally added to the directory as well so the next person from your department can find it; if a later search doesn't show it, contact support and we'll add the entry.

My department name didn't match the directory

The directory comes from the USFA National Fire Department Registry, which often drops a leading "City of" or "Township of" from a name. Search ignores that leading phrase too, so City of Lewisburg Fire Department finds Lewisburg Fire Department. Words in the middle of a name still count — Union Township Fire Department and Union Fire Department are different departments, so include "Township" if it's part of the name. If your typed name was close to one or more directory entries, the Join your department page shows Is this your department? with the nearest matches, each with its city and state. Select Ask to join on the right one to send a normal join request.

If nothing matches and you're sure your department exists, try a shorter name, just the city, or the city plus state abbreviation.

Why can't I see the new member on the roster yet?

They haven't been approved. A join request doesn't create a membership until an administrator selects Approve.
They haven't verified their email. A signup that never completes verification never reaches your join requests list.
They accepted an email invite while you had the members page open. The page refreshes the members list when a pending invite disappears, but if it hasn't caught up, reload the page.
They used an invite link that had expired or been revoked. They'll see "That invite link is no longer valid" and can ask to join through the directory instead.

The signup form has an optional Phone field. Leave it blank if you like, but if you start typing one, enter all ten digits or clear the field — the Create Account button stays disabled while a partial number is in it. You can add or change it later from your Account page (open your name in the sidebar).

Common Questions

Can an invite link make someone an Admin?

No. Links always grant the Member role. Change the person's role from the members page after they join.

I sent a join request to the wrong department. What do I do?

Go back to the Join your department page and search for the right one — you can have a few requests pending at once. The wrong request expires on its own after 30 days, or an administrator there can deny it.

Can I still invite people by email?

Yes. Invite Members on the members page still invites a specific person: if the address doesn't have an account yet they get an email invitation and skip the department picker when they sign up; if it already belongs to an account, that person is added directly and sees an in-app notification instead of an email. Re-inviting a pending address doesn't send another email unless you use Resend. Use a link when you want to onboard a whole crew at once; use an email invite when you want a specific person.

Someone from my department created a duplicate. How do I fix it?

Contact support and tell us both department names. We can merge or remove the duplicate.

Does denying a request block that person?

No. Denying only closes that request. You can invite them by email or link at any time. They can't send a new request to the same department until the denied one expires (30 days after it was sent), so an invite is the quickest way to bring them in after a denial.

Need Help?

If someone can't get into your department, or you're not sure whether your department is already on Command Established, reach out and we'll sort it out.

Contact Support