August 18, 2005
2005-25
The Office of the Fire Marshal (OFM) and the Government of Ontario have set
as a key goal the increased use of technology to improve the efficiency and
delivery of services to stakeholders and Ontario residents.
With this goal in mind, the OFM encourages all fire departments that do not
currently use electronic mail (e-mail) to set up an e-mail account and obtain an
e-mail address. E-mail offers many advantages:
Speed
Messages sent are received almost instantaneously, in minutes.
Convenience
E-mail saves time; unlike traditional mail, e-mail does not require printing, stuffing in envelopes, preparing labels, affixing postage and mailing.
Sending or reading e-mail message can be done at any time during the day or night, any day of the week.
E-mail enables communicating with a group of people by sending a single message.
With e-mail, it is possible to attach electronic documents and attachments (pictures, video clips, audio clips).
Cost
With e-mail, there are no costs for postage, printing, paper and envelopes, and labels.
Once an e-mail account has been set up, a person can send as many messages as he/she wishes without incurring additional costs.
Using a commercial free e-mail provider is an economical way of having an e mail account.
Positive corporate image
E-mail is quickly becoming the preferred method for day-to-day business communication. The public perceives an organization/business with an e-mail address as being up to date, progressive and easy to reach.
With e-mail, fire departments can:
communicate quickly and easily with other fire departments, residents of the community, the municipal government, the Office of the Fire Marshal and other provincial government departments, and professional organizations;
obtain information quickly;
submit incident reports electronically to the OFM;
receive yearly verification reports electronically from the OFM;
use e-mail for distance education and training;
send book and video loan requests, reference questions and recommendations for new resources to the OFM Fire Sciences Library; and
have their e-mail address on the Fire Sciences Library mailing list and receive notification of the new print and audiovisual resources that have been added to the collection.
E-mail presents many other interesting possibilities. Once a large majority
of fire departments have e-mail addresses, the OFM would be able to use e-mail
to send out OFM publications, customer service surveys, messages from the Fire
Marshal, etc.
The OFM strives to keep its list of fire department e-mail addresses up to date.
If your fire department currently has an e-mail address, please send it to
OFMDATS@jus.gov.on.ca. Fire
departments that do not currently have an e-mail address are asked to send their
e-mail address to the OFM once they have set one up. Your cooperation is
appreciated.
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