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---
layout: page
title: Bodies and Contacts in FixMyStreet
author: dave
---
# Managing bodies and contacts in FixMyStreet
<p class="lead">A <strong><a href="/glossary/#body" class="glossary__link">body</a></strong> is the authority to which problem
reports will be sent. Each body needs one or more <strong><a href="{{ "/glossary/#contact" | relative_url }}" class="glossary__link">contacts</a></strong>
(typically these are email addresses) to which particular
<strong><a href="{{ "/glossary/#category" | relative_url }}" class="glossary__link">categories</a></strong> of problem are sent. </p>
For [FixMyStreet in the UK](https://www.fixmystreet.com/), bodies are councils (county, district, and metropolitan).
## How to add (or edit) a body
You need access to the administration pages of your FixMyStreet installation.
By default, this is at `/admin`.
Click on **Bodies** and fill in the form. Normally, you _must_ provide a name
and pick at least one area it covers. See [How FixMyStreet uses
MapIt](/customising/fms_and_mapit) for more information on how these areas are chosen.
You can specify a <strong><a href="{{ "/glossary/#send-method" | relative_url }}" class="glossary__link">send method</a></strong>. This is *how* FixMyStreet will send the
problem reports to this body.
If you leave it blank, **send method will default to email**.
A body can have none, one, or many contacts. We strongly recommend every body
has at least one.
## Add contacts for every category of problem this body can handle
Even if you only have one email address for the body, you can add multiple
contacts, because each contact is for a particular **category** of problem. So
even if all the contacts' email addresses are the same, FixMyStreet treats
them separately. This often makes sense because the body passes these reports
on to different departments internally. This is also the mechanism FixMyStreet
uses to describe the category of the problem to the body: it's included,
clearly, in the email that is sent.
Here's an example of a body and its contacts:
Body: South Borsetshire District Council
Contacts:
Category Email
---------------------------------------------------
Bridges road_department@sbdc.gov.uk
Potholes road_department@sbdc.gov.uk
Traffic lights road_department@sbdc.gov.uk
Graffiti services@sbdc.gov.uk
Street lighting lights@sbdc.gov.uk
Other enquiries@sbdc.gov.uk
Problems about bridges, potholes, and traffic lights in South Borsetshire all
get sent to the same email address. Don't worry about the order in which the
contacts appear in the admin, because FixMyStreet sorts them before presenting
them to the user.
The FixMyStreet admin makes it easy to change your setup if the body changes
its email addresses or even adds a new department after your site is running.
<div class="attention-box warning">
<h3>A body with no contacts will never receive any reports</h3>
<p>
We do not recommend you run your installation of FixMyStreet with bodies that
have no contacts. Problems submitted to such a body will remain on the site
but will not be sent. Problems like this may never get fixed.
</p>
<p>
You really need to find at least one working contact for each body to which
you want to send reports. This isn't a technical problem, but it can be one of
the more difficult parts about setting up FixMyStreet.
</p>
</div>
### Normally, contacts use email addresses
In most new installations, each contact needs an email address because
FixMyStreet will send the problem report to the body by email (that's the
default **send method** for bodies). Make sure you enter the correct email
address! Note that the public users of FixMyStreet do not automatically see
these email addresses, because FixMyStreet sends them directly to the body and
not to the user.
If you're only using email as the send method (which is by far the most
common), you don't need to provide any more data (such as endpoints or API
keys). These fields are for alternatives to email.
### Alternatives to email addresses
Although the default method for sending reports is email, there are other ways
of sending the reports. Note, though, that alternatives to email are only
possible if the body to which you are trying to send reports supports them.
Some do; many do not.
See
[more about integration]({{ "/customising/integration/" | relative_url }})
to understand the different ways this can work. The first stage of
integration is injecting problem reports directly into the body's back-end
system.
We like
<a href="{{ "/glossary/#open311" | relative_url }}" class="glossary__link">Open311</a>,
which is an open standard for
submitting problem reports to a body automatically (by sending the data
directly to a webservice that consumes it). FixMyStreet also has a number of
other, custom, methods for submitting data that we've written for specific
councils in the UK: if you need to write your own, look at the code or ask us
to help you. Custom integrations can sometimes be difficult, depending on how
easy it is to get data in and out of the body's internal, back-end systems.
You can change a body's send method -- for example, if you start by sending
emails, but then discover the body is running an Open311 server, it's easy to
change over. Note that if you choose a different send method, FixMyStreet will
need some extra information, such as the URL of the body's endpoint. This
appears on the form if it's needed.
For more information about Open311, see [this blog post explaining
it](https://www.mysociety.org/blog/open311-explained).
#### Not all of a body's contacts need to be sent the same way
In fact, if you're working on an installation that can connect to bodies using
a method other than email, not *all* of a body's contacts need to be sent the
same way. It's possible to specify a different
<a href="{{ "/glossary/#send-method" | relative_url }}" class="glossary__link">send method</a>
for an individual contact. To do this you need to tell FixMyStreet that, for
this body, the decision of which send method to use can be
<a href="{{ "/glossary/#devolve" | relative_url }}" class="glossary__link">devolved</a>
to the contacts. You'll need to edit the body (in `/admin`) and check the box
marked "Contacts can be devolved". Then mark each of the contacts that are not
using the body's send method (which by default is email) as "devolved", and
specify their own send method and details.
## Deleting contacts
If a contact is no longer valid, you can delete it or mark it as inactive. Find
it on the body's admin page, click to edit it, and select **inactive** or
**deleted**.
Inactive contacts can still be filtered on map pages, but deleted contacts will
not appear there at all. Neither sort of contact can be used for new reports.
Deleted contacts are not removed from the FixMyStreet database because doing
so might break any existing problem reports that used it.
## Deleting bodies
It's unusual to need to delete a body, but it sometimes happens — for
example, if a body ceases to exist because it has merged with an existing
one. If this happens, remember that you may also need to create a new body, or
change the
<a href="/glossary/#area" class="glossary__link">admin boundary</a>
of an existing one.
To delete a body, go to the body's admin page to edit it. Tick the checkbox
marked **Flag as deleted**, and then click **Update body**.
This does not remove the body from the FixMyStreet database (because there may
be existing problem reports that depend on it). The reports, and the "deleted"
body, remain as historic data. Users cannot submit reports to a deleted body.
<div class="attention-box warning">
If you're testing FixMyStreet and you're sure you want to <em>really</em>
delete a body, because you just created it as test, you need to delete it
directly within the database.
You cannot do destructive deletion like this through the admin interface.
<p>
We recommend you do your testing on a
<a href="/glossary/#staging" class="glossary__link">staging site</a>
rather than
<a href="/glossary/#production" class="glossary__link">production</a>.
</p>
</div>
In the UK, where FixMyStreet has been running for a long time, there have
been several changes to the councils that we cover. You can see deleted councils
marked in grey on [the list of councils](https://www.fixmystreet.com/reports).
We handle deleted councils as a special case because we want to direct the user
to the appropriate extant body instead. For example, see the page for
[Alnwick Council's reports](https://www.fixmystreet.com/reports/Alnwick); that
council ceased to exist in 2009.
If you want to replicate behaviour like this on your site, copy the
`reports/_body_gone.html` template from the `fixmystreet.com` cobrand into your
own <a href="/glossary/#cobrand" class="glossary__link">cobrand</a>,
<a href="/customising/templates/">customise it</a>, and make sure you update
the body to not be associated with any area. You can do this by editing the
body, and at the **Area covered** drop-down menu making sure no areas are
selected.
|
