CrownSync Playbooks keeps you informed about important activity within your organisation through a notification system that delivers alerts both within the application and via email. You can configure which notifications you receive and how they are delivered to ensure you stay informed without being overwhelmed.

The Notification Bell

The notification bell icon appears in the top navigation bar on every page. When you have unread notifications, a badge on the bell displays the count of unread items. Clicking the bell opens a dropdown panel listing your recent notifications in reverse chronological order.

Each notification in the panel shows:

An icon indicating the notification type (e.g., a shield for incidents, a pencil for edits)
A brief description of the event
The time it occurred (displayed as relative time, e.g., “5 minutes ago”)
An unread indicator (a coloured dot) that disappears once you view the notification

Clicking a notification navigates you directly to the relevant page — for example, clicking an incident notification takes you to that incident's timeline.

Notification Preferences

You can configure your notification preferences from the settings page, accessible via your profile menu. Preferences are set per notification type and per delivery channel.

The two delivery channels are:

In-app— Notifications appear in the bell dropdown and are stored for up to 30 days. These are always enabled for critical notifications such as incident declarations.
Email— Notifications are sent to your registered email address. Email notifications can be enabled or disabled per type. Emails are sent from [email protected] via Resend.

Email vs In-App Notifications

For time-sensitive events, both channels are recommended. For routine activity, in-app notifications alone may suffice. Here is a summary of the default configuration:

Incident declared— Both in-app and email (cannot disable in-app)
Incident status change— Both in-app and email
Regulatory deadline approaching— Both in-app and email (cannot disable)
Section edited by collaborator— In-app only (email optional)
New team member joined— In-app only
PDF export completed— In-app only
Baseline content updated— Both in-app and email
Drill scheduled or completed— Both in-app and email

Critical notifications cannot be disabled

Certain notifications — particularly incident declarations and regulatory deadline warnings — cannot be disabled. These are considered critical for compliance and organisational safety. You can control the email delivery channel for some of these, but the in-app notification will always appear.

Types of Notifications

CrownSync Playbooks generates notifications for the following events:

Incidents — Declarations, severity changes, status transitions, phase completions, and closures
Regulatory — Deadline reminders at 48 hours, 24 hours, and 4 hours before expiry
Playbooks — Section edits, version publishes, baseline updates, and collaborator assignments
Collaboration — Team invitations, collaborator invitations, and access revocations
Exports — PDF generation completions and batch export readiness
Drills — Drill scheduling, completion, and report availability
Administration — Subscription changes, profile updates, and integration status changes

Managing Your Notifications

From the notification dropdown, you can:

Mark all as read — Clears the unread badge on all current notifications
Mark individual as read — Click the dot next to a specific notification
View all — Opens a full-page notification history with filtering options

The full notification history page allows you to filter by type, date range, and read status. Notifications older than 30 days are automatically archived but remain accessible through the audit log for compliance purposes.