Incident response

On-call schedules

Define rotations, review coverage, and apply temporary overrides.

A schedule answers who is on call at a given moment. Escalation policies decide which schedule is paged first and what happens if nobody acknowledges.

Before you begin

You need tenant-owner or tenant-administrator access and at least one enabled responder . Decide the schedule timezone, rotation start, shift length, handoff order, and any weekday or time-of-day restrictions. If a team should own the schedule, create that team first.

Open On-call → Schedules. The page defaults to All schedules — one lane each, so gaps and overlapping coverage can be reviewed across the tenant before opening an individual schedule.

Read the timeline

Use Day, Week, 2 weeks, or 4 weeks to change the visible range. The timeline shows:

• One lane per schedule in the all-schedules view.
• The resolved on-call responder for each covered window.
• No coverage when no rotation or override supplies a responder.
• A current-time marker and controls to return to Today.

Select a schedule name to view its rotations and detailed timeline.

Schedules do not page together merely because they overlap. A policy chooses the schedule; overlapping rotations inside that schedule are paged together.

Understand rotation boundaries

Review these behaviors before saving a rotation:

• The schedule timezone controls displayed handoffs, weekday restrictions, and time-of-day windows.
• An hours shift is a fixed elapsed duration. Its displayed local handoff time can move by an hour when daylight saving time changes.
• A days or weeks shift preserves its local wall-clock handoff time through daylight saving changes.
• Before a rotation’s configured start, WarnFire treats its first responder as on call. A future start stages the repeating order; it does not create an uncovered interval before that date.
• A restricted overnight window belongs to the weekday on which it starts. For example, a Monday 22:00–06:00 window runs into Tuesday morning.
• If two active rotations in the same schedule cover the same moment, the schedule resolves every on-call responder from both rotations. A policy that targets the schedule can therefore page several people.

Create a schedule

1. Open On-call → Schedules.
2. In New schedule, enter the Schedule name and select the Timezone.
3. Optionally select the team that owns the schedule.
4. Configure Rotation 1:
   • Enter a rotation name.
   • Set its start time.
   • Choose a shift length in hours, days, or weeks.
   • Add responders in rotation order.
   • Select covered weekdays and time windows when the rotation is not continuous.
5. Select + Add rotation when another responder should be on call at the same time under a separate rotation.
6. Select Create schedule.

Most teams begin with one continuous rotation. Add another when distinct groups cover different windows, such as business hours and nights or follow-the-sun coverage.

If multiple rotations in the same schedule cover the same moment, every resolved on-call responder from those rotations is eligible to be paged together.

If a policy selects SMS or voice for that schedule target, each resolved responder consumes the corresponding allowance or prepaid credits when contacted.

Apply an override

An override temporarily replaces normal rotation coverage without changing the repeating rotation.

1. Choose Add override.
2. Select the schedule and, when applicable, a specific rotation or all rotations.
3. Select the covering responder and the start and end times.
4. Save the override.

The schedule page lists active and upcoming overrides and shows them on the timeline. Remove an override when it should no longer affect coverage.

Accepted mobile cover requests and shift swaps also create overrides. See Covering and swapping shifts .

Review schedules on mobile

The mobile Status tab shows:

• On call now, including the current window and schedule.
• View schedule, which opens the schedule calendar.
• Upcoming shifts in the next two weeks.
• Cover and Swap actions for eligible current or future shifts.

If no additional shift is scheduled, the app says so rather than implying the responder is never on call. Current coverage is shown separately.

Safety behavior

• No coverage is an operational warning. Add a rotation or override before relying on the schedule.
• Schedule changes affect new incidents. An incident already open keeps the escalation plan captured when it opened.
• WarnFire blocks disabling or deleting a schedule when doing so would leave a dependent live configuration invalid.
• Cover and swap acceptance rechecks current schedule ownership before applying an override.

Verify it worked

1. Confirm that the schedule appears under On-call → Schedules as enabled.
2. Confirm that On call now names the expected responder. If it says Uncovered, correct the rotation before using the schedule.
3. Open the schedule timeline and inspect the next handoff and every restricted coverage window.
4. Return to All schedules — one lane each and confirm that no unexpected No coverage interval appears.

Next step

Create an escalation policy and target this schedule so incidents can page its on-call responder.