Incident Reporting Writing And Witness Statements

You should write the report as soon as possible but at least by the end of your shift. You should never leave a report to be written after the end of your shift. Your memory will not be as fresh and other parties will not be available to verify facts and details.

Yes, your statements can definitely expose Gap Inc. and Guardsmark as well as yourself to potential civil liability if incorrect or poorly written. This is why you should always review your statement with your supervisor before sending. Once something is sent in email it becomes a permanent document. Email never expires and can be retrieved years even decades after sent. Even deleted emails can be retrieved via the email backups and servers.

When a third party reads our reports, spelling and/or grammatically errors will damage our credibility. It is very important that as much as possible that we do not make these errors.

It is always a good idea to have your supervisor or another security officer read your report before you send it. Read it out loud to make sure what you think is on the screen is what you actually hear when you read it. Often your brain will fill in what you want to say with what is actually on the screen. Finally, run spell check one last time before sending your document.

You may only share your report with your Guardsmark Supervisors or Gap Inc.Security Management. If anyone else asks to see or receive a copy of your report, contact Gap Inc. Security Management for further direction.

Remember that a witness statement or incident report is just the who, what, when, why and how of what you personally saw, heard, touched, smelt or felt. Nothing beyond those statements of fact.

This is not the time for your opinions, your assumptions, your theories or for your recommendations.

No, abbreviations should not be used. In fact the word "OK" is an abbreviation. The only acceptable abbreviations are "a.m" and p.m." for time. The reason is because all witness statements or incidents reports should be written in clear, common language that may be understand be the average person. Keep in mind you should always write all statements as though you are testifying on the witness stand in court.

Anytime EMS, police or the fire department are involved you must get the full name of the lead or commanding officer, their badge number and the vehicle number of the fire truck, engine or ambulance.

Dates should be written in their full format and times should always be listed in a.m. and p.m. As always the goal is for the report to be clear to anyone reading the report. A 24 hour clock although common for security or police organizations is not common to average person. Your audience is always the jury.

An incident report should always be a direct account of the security team member that either witnessed the incident or responded to the incident.

You must find out what hospital the business partner is being taken to so that this can be communicated back to their manager who will will in turn notify Human Resources and the business partner's emergency contact.