You should print off Message Forms for use for every single incoming and outgoing QTC. This is not mainly for reasons of being familiar with the form or for practice, but for efficiency, filing and keeping track, it saves a lot of work and errors later on.
Have you got message forms printed out? Are you writing down message on those forms or in a book or on a sheet of paper?
When you compose messages for sending, are you doing that on printed Message forms, or in a book or on a sheet of paper?
You will find it difficult to provide SAR reports at the end of the month if you are not using Forms and filing them in a manner similar to what was discussed elsewhere, QTC waiting to be sent or relayed, Received, and Sent.
There are a great many reasons you should be using forms, and to get CWB Certified Communicator status, you should be using the forms as this has several advantages:
- You don't miss anything out
- Filing and record keeping is easy
- Compiling SAR at months end is easy
- Not making mistakes in sequential numbers
- It's the real thing we would use for 3rd parties
- When passed on they are unambiguous
- The Forms allow for cross-agency compatibility
- The Forms provide tracking and analysis data
Even messages sent by other methods such as computer, may be advantageous to be transferred to the written forms, certainly for CWB purposes and to take advantage of some of the above benefits.
If you can't print the forms, consider cutting A4 sheets of paper in half, and drawing up the forms with a ruler and pencil or pen.
