The report flow is the front door of a 311 system. If it's slow or confusing, residents give up and call instead. We designed the Sentra 311 flow around one idea: start with the thing the resident already has in front of them, the problem itself.
Here is the flow, step by step, and why each step exists.
Step 1: The photo
The resident opens the city's report page, the resident app or the button on the city website, and takes a photo. They can also choose one from their library, or skip the photo.
Starting with the photo does three things:
- It finds the location. Most phone photos carry the spot where they were taken. When they do, the pin drops there automatically.
- It helps suggest the type. Sentra 311 can suggest a request type from the photo. The resident still chooses.
- It helps the crew. A photo of a pothole next to a bus stop tells a crew more than "pothole on Main Street."
Step 2: What is it?
The resident picks the type of problem. Cities set up their own types, grouped the way residents think about them: Streets and sidewalks, Streetlights, Trash, Water, Parks and so on. Each type has an icon and a short description.
If the resident isn't sure, they can type a few words, like "big hole by the bus stop", and ask for a suggestion. The suggestion uses AI on the photo and the words, and only lists types the city has set up. The resident always confirms.
If a type is marked as an emergency, such as a downed power line or a gas smell, the flow stops and tells the resident to call 911. Emergencies don't belong in a 311 queue.
Step 3: Before you report
For many types, the city has short answers that solve the issue without a report: "Trash day moved to Tuesday this week", or "Streetlights on wooden poles belong to the utility company. Here's their number." Sentra 311 shows those answers from the city's knowledge base at this step. If the answer helps, the resident says so and nothing is filed.
Step 4: Where is it?
The resident confirms the spot on a map. They can drag the pin, tap the map or search for an address. Address search checks the city's own address layer first, when the city has one, so official addresses come up before anything else.
If the pin is outside city limits, the resident is told so before sending. That keeps county roads and neighboring cities out of your queue. The system also looks up the council district and any other city GIS layers set up for that type.
Step 5: A few details
Each request type has its own short form. A pothole might ask "Is it in a traffic lane?" A missed trash pickup might ask which cart. Cities build these forms themselves in the portal, and every request keeps the version of the form it was filed with.
Contact details are optional. If the resident gives an email, they get updates. If not, they still get a tracking number.
Step 6: Sent
The resident sees a confirmation with their request number, a link to copy and a short "what happens next." The same link shows the progress tracker, public updates from the city, and the before and after photos when the work is done.
Within seven days of a fix, the resident can rate the work or say it isn't fixed. "Not fixed" reopens the request and sends it back to a supervisor.
Already reported?
On the resident app, residents can see open problems reported nearby. If their problem is already there, they can tap "Me too" to follow it instead of filing a duplicate. Staff can also merge duplicates in the portal, and everyone who reported gets the same updates.
On the city website
Cities can add a report button to their own website with a short embed code. It opens the same flow in a panel, in the city's colors. The city's report page can also be customized from the portal: banner photo, headline, featured request types, a notice for holidays and more.
Why it stays short
Every extra field costs reports. We keep the required steps to what a crew actually needs: where, what, and a photo when possible. Everything else is optional. That's how a resident can finish a report while standing at the curb.