Referral Settings: Community Queue

Community Queues provide communities with the tools to triage and prioritize client referrals across programs, agencies, and systems of care. Community Queues are highly customizable and can be adapted to a range of local processes and approaches to Coordinated Entry as well as other systems of resource connection. 

For users to refer clients to a Community Queue, system administrators must enable Community Referral Queue in Referral Settings. Once this setting is toggled on, the system displays several additional configuration options.

Please refer to Community Queue for End Users for details on using the Community Queue at the end-user level.

To enable Community Queues, click the launchpad and navigate to Setup > Settings > Referral Settings.

Click the edit icon next to the Referral Settings you would like to configure (there may be more than one if system administrators set up multiple Referral Settings).

Toggle on Community Referral Queue and click SAVE CHANGES. 

After saving, the Community Queues section displays.

When Community Referral Queue is enabled, a default Community Queue displays. This queue can be renamed but it cannot be deleted. If a community is using Multiple Community Queues, these will display here as well. 

The following settings apply to all Community Queue referrals (system administrators configure the remaining settings at the individual queue-level):

• Use Custom Fields on Program Availability: this setting allows system administrators to configure custom fields for posting program availability openings in the Availability tab. When enabled, the Program Availability Custom Fields section displays. System administrators can add custom fields by clicking Add New Custom Field.
  • NOTE: For the Name field, the first character must be a lower case letter and the field can only contain lower case letters, numbers, and underscores.
• Matchmaker Referral to Ineligible Program: when enabled, users with Referral Match Maker enabled in their Access Role can create a referral to a program a client is ineligible for from an assessment with Eligibility Engine toggled on. 

Whether a community is using a single queue or multiple queues, system administrators configure the remaining Community Queue settings within the Community Queues section. To edit a queue, click the edit icon next to the queue.

Allow Referral to Community Queue: if toggled on, system administrators define which assessments staff members use to refer clients to the queue. If toggled off, users can’t refer to the queue from Program Eligibility Determination within the (client or program-level) Assessments tab.

If sending the referral to a Community Queue during the denial process, users can select a queue with Allow Referral to Community Queue toggled off. See the "Sending a Denied Referral to a Community Queue" section of Updating the Status of a Referral for more information. 

After clicking Save Changes, if Allow Referral to Community Queue is toggled on, the Assessments section displays. To add assessments, click “Add Assessment.”

In the Add Assessment pop-up, select the assessment(s) you would like staff members to use to refer to the community queue (the system makes all Assessment Screens available to choose from).

Note: the assessment must also have Eligibility Engine enabled and be available to the agency or program to refer the client to the queue from the Assessments tab. 

Allow Moving to Queue: if this setting is toggled on, users can move a referral to a different Community Queue within the same Referral Setting while maintaining all of the referral’s history (original referrer, length of time on queue, etc.). The function will be provided via a MOVE TO ANOTHER QUEUE section on the Referrals tab if all of the following are true:

• Multiple Community Queues have been configured under Setup > Settings > Referral Settings.
• The Allow Moving to Queue setting on the MODIFY COMMUNITY QUEUE page is toggled on.
• The Referrals - Community Queue Access Right is enabled for the user.
• The Referrals - Move Referral Access Right is enabled for the user. This setting is dependant on Referrals - Community Queue.

The user will be able to move a referral by making a selection from the Community Queue picklist and clicking SAVE CHANGES. The picklist will not include the current Community Queue, and users will not be able to move a referral to a Community Queue where the client already has a referral. 

Automated removal from the Community Queue: when enabled, a program exit to a permanent destination will trigger an automatic update to a Community Queue referral’s Remove from Queue section. Upon program exit, a confirmation pop-up message appears to alert the user that the client will be removed from the Community Queue. The system records a response of “Self Resolved” for the field Reason for Removal. This feature is also tied directly to Enabled Automated Functions within System Setup: Settings.

Prioritization List: when enabled, the system records a value of “1” (“Placed on Prioritization List”) for program-level Coordinated Entry Assessments referred to the queue. For more information, see Prioritization Status.

Community Referral Threshold: This setting allows you to select how long the system will wait before sending a referral back to the Community Queue tab from the Pending tab. The default setting for a new Community Queue is "None." System administrators can set the threshold between 1 and 720 days.

Display Option to “Send to Queue” at Denial or Expiration: this setting controls what type of referrals a user can send to a Community Queue when changing the status of a referral to “Denied” or “Expired.” These options are:

• Qualified Referrals: referrals made from the Assessments tab
• Unqualified Referrals: referrals not previously sent to a Community Queue 
• Reassigned Referrals: referrals reassigned to a program from a Community Queue 
• Qualified and Reassigned Referrals: referrals made from the Assessments tab and referrals reassigned to a program from a Community Queue 
• All Referrals: all referrals
• No Referrals: no referrals 

Inactive Referral Expiration Threshold: how long the system allows a referral to remain in the Community Queue with no client activity (referral сheck-in, services, assessments, program enrollments, status assessments, program exits, or notes). The default setting for a new Community Queue is "None." System administrators can set the threshold between 1 and 720 days. Once a client meets the Inactive Referral Expiration Threshold, the system automatically changes the referral status to “Expired” and moves it to the Denied tab.  

Matching Process: this setting defines whether designated staff members (assigned by Access Role) have the ability to re-assign Community Queue referrals to agencies other than their own. There are three available settings:

• Agency Controlled: users can only re-assign referrals to programs within their agency.
• Match Maker Controlled: only staff members with Referral Match Maker enabled in their Access Role can re-assign referrals, and they have access to re-assign to other agencies’ programs.
• Both: Staff members with Referral Match Maker enabled in their Access Role can re-assign referrals to other agencies’ programs. Staff members who don't have Referral Match Maker enabled can only assign clients to their agency programs.

Program Availability Management: toggling on this setting enables two functions:

• Enables the Availability tab to appear under the Global Referrals tab. Enabling this setting allows users to view program availability. Users can set program availability to Full Availability, Limited Availability, or No Availability. With Limited Availability, users can add or delete openings for the program.
• Displays a drop-down list of Programs in the REASSIGN section of the REFERRALS: ASSIGN page. Matchmakers reassign a client to a Program in this list based on their assessment score and other criteria.

Use Most Recent Assessment: toggling on this setting displays an Update Historic Data link if the assessment that was used to refer the client to the Community Queue has been completed again, resulting in a new score. Click the Update Historic Data link to update referrals in the Community Queue to that recently completed assessment, regardless of whether a user saved the assessment before or after "Use Most Recent Assessment" was enabled. 

Community Queue Snooze: permits users to temporarily move a referral from the Community Queue to the Snoozed tab by picking a "Snooze Until" date. Once the time period passes, the referral will return to the Community Queue tab.