Starter Roles
What each role RAM gives your agency allows, and examples of roles built for common jobs. For how to assign and change roles, see Roles & Permissions. For every single permission, see the Permission Reference.
Table of Contents
System roles, starter roles, and roles you create
The Access Roles screen tags every role System role or Custom.
| System roles | Starter roles and roles you create | |
|---|---|---|
| Which | Agency Admin and Agency User | The other seven starter roles, and any role you create |
| Rename or change the description | No | Yes |
| Delete | No | Yes, once nobody holds it |
| Change which permissions it includes | Agency User: yes. Agency Admin: not applicable | Yes |
- Starter roles are the seven roles a new agency begins with, other than the two system roles. Two of them, the animal roles, appear only if your agency uses Animal Management. The screen tags them Custom because they are fully editable. Rename them, add or remove permissions, duplicate them, or delete the ones you don't need.
- Changes only affect your agency. Editing a starter role never changes another agency's copy.
- You can create as many custom roles as you like, from scratch or by duplicating an existing one.
- Agency User is the baseline role. Every member holds it automatically, and it can't be renamed or deleted. Be careful when editing its permissions, because the change applies to everyone.
The note at the top of the Access Roles screen says system roles are managed by RAM and can't be changed or deleted. The name and description are locked, and the role can't be deleted. You can still select or clear permissions on Agency User.
The starter roles
These are the permissions each starter role begins with in a new agency. Your agency may have changed them, so open a role on the Access Roles screen to see what it grants today.
Permission names are as they appear on the screen; each is explained in the Permission Reference.
| Role | System role? | What it is for |
|---|---|---|
| Agency Admin | Yes | Full access to everything. Give it to leadership. |
| Agency User | Yes | The baseline every member holds: read-only access to most areas, plus starting group chats. |
| Inventory Manager | No | Runs the equipment program. |
| Training Manager | No | Runs certifications and training activities. |
| Operations Manager | No | Runs emergency alerts and alert devices; also holds incident and map permissions (documented separately). |
| Membership Manager | No | Runs the roster and chat administration. |
| Member Medical Manager | No | Placeholder; holds no permissions (see below). |
| Animal Medical Manager | No | Animal health records. Appears only if your agency uses Animal Management. |
| Animal Manager | No | Working-animal profiles. Appears only if your agency uses Animal Management. |
Agency Admin
No list of permissions. Full access, always. See Agency Admin is different.
Agency User
Every member holds this role automatically.
- View assets, View storage locations
- View activities
- View certifications
- View members
- View documents
- View chat, Create chat
- View alerts
- View incidents, View lost-person questionnaires, and map access level View (incident and map features are documented separately)
Inventory Manager
- View assets, Create assets, Edit assets, Archive assets, Check out assets, Transfer assets
- View storage locations, Edit storage locations
- View asset compliance, Export asset compliance, Export assets for any member, Create log entries for any asset
- View archived assets, Manage archived assets
Training Manager
- View certifications, Create / Edit / Delete certifications for any member, Manage certification templates, Validate certifications
- Import certifications for any member, Export certifications for any member
- View qualifications, Create qualifications, Edit qualifications, Delete qualifications, Manage qualification members
- View activities, Create activities, Edit activities, Delete activities, Approve activity attendance, Generate activity QR codes, Manage activity check-in and check-out
- View the audit log, Export audit logs. View the audit log also opens the Agency Activity Log, which Approve activity attendance works in.
- Manage deleted certifications, View archived certifications
Operations Manager
- Alerts: View alerts, Create alerts, Edit alerts, Delete alerts, Manage alert groups
- Alert devices: View, Create, and Delete alert devices
- Manage activity check-in and check-out
- View asset compliance, Create log entries for any asset
- View the audit log, Export audit logs. View the audit log also opens the Agency Activity Log (every member's service entries).
- Incident, map, archived-incident, and lost-person questionnaire permissions (see Operations & Incidents and Map access)
Membership Manager
- View members, Create members, Edit members, Delete members, Resend member invitations
- View chat, Create chat, Delete chat, Manage chat groups
- Manage deleted members
Member Medical Manager
A placeholder. Dedicated cross-member medical records are not available yet, so this role includes no permissions, and it is safe to delete. Members already manage their own medical information without any role.
Animal Medical Manager
- View, Create, Edit, and Delete animal medical records
Animal Manager
- View animals, Create animals, Edit animals, Delete animals
Worked examples
Each recipe uses permissions listed in the Permission Reference. Every one assumes the member keeps Agency User, which they always do. Where a role is described as "start from", duplicate that starter role and trim it.
Someone who manages equipment but shouldn't edit member records
Give them the starter Inventory Manager role. It includes everything for the equipment program: view, create, edit, archive, check out, transfer, storage locations, compliance and exports, log entries, and archived assets.
A member who should only add assets, such as a volunteer logging new gear, can get just Create assets. They can add assets, choose where each starts, and keep editing the ones they added, but cannot change an asset someone else added, move one, or archive one.
A member who only hands gear out and takes it back can get Check out assets alone. They can sign an asset out from storage and return it, and nothing more. See the table of Asset Actions choices in the Permission Reference.
Why they cannot touch member records: nothing in Inventory Manager includes any Membership permission. They will still see the team roster (every member does through Agency User), but they cannot add, edit, or delete anyone.
A training officer
Give them Training Manager. It covers certifications (view, create, edit, delete for any member, templates, validate) and training activities (create, edit, delete, approve attendance, QR codes, check-in and check-out), plus bulk import and export of certifications, the five Qualification permissions, viewing and exporting the audit log, and the deleted and archived certifications pages.
Deleting a qualification does not destroy it. It waits 30 days in Archives → Qualifications, where someone holding Delete qualifications can restore it.
A treasurer
RAM has no finance or billing permissions, there is no Finance category, and your plan and billing screens stay with Agency Admins. The closest read-only role for someone who needs to see where the agency's money is tied up is a custom role called, say, Treasurer, with:
- View asset compliance: the asset compliance dashboard.
- Export assets for any member and Export asset compliance: download the full asset list as a spreadsheet and the compliance PDF.
Every member already has View assets and View storage locations through Agency User, so the Treasurer can see every asset and its value. So can any other member, and any member can run the asset valuation report.
If they need to change plans or payment details, they need Agency Admin.
The person who runs the sign-in sheet at events
Create a custom role, Event Check-In, with:
- View activities (needed so the other two can be switched on)
- Manage activity check-in and check-out: check other members in and out, and use the Activity Sign-In Sheet. See Activity Sign-In Sheet.
- Generate activity QR codes: show the check-in QR code from the activity's details window.
Leave Edit activities out. It lets the holder change the event itself, and it does not open the sign-in sheet.
A dispatcher who sends alerts
Requires Rapid Emergency Alerting on your plan. Create Alert Dispatcher with:
- View alerts, Create alerts: open the call-outs page and send alerts.
- Edit alerts: use Update Status to resolve an alert. In the web app the button is available only to holders of this permission, including for alerts they sent.
Add Manage alert groups if they maintain the groups alerts go to. See Rapid Emergency Alerting.
A membership coordinator
Give them Membership Manager (roster, invitations, chat administration). Before you do, remember that Create members and Edit members both let them give roles to members who are not administrators, strong roles included. If you do not want them handing out roles, give a trimmed custom role that leaves out both. They then cannot add or edit members either, so let an administrator do that and set the roles.
A read-only auditor
Create Auditor with View the audit log. They can read the audit log (the Audit Logs item in the left menu) and the Agency Activity Log, but cannot export. Add Export audit logs only if they need to take a copy away (see Permission Reference).
A document librarian
Create Librarian with View documents, Create documents, Edit documents, Delete documents, and, if they decide which PDFs carry the personalized watermark, Docs — Manage watermarking. Do not add Download documents or Print documents unless the librarian needs them; Print documents hides the button only, and anyone who can see a document can still print it from the browser menu. Only Agency Admins can download until you add Download documents to a role, so copies stay on screen by default.