Understand HICSNow subscription plans
HICSNow offers three subscription plans: Essentials, Professional, and Enterprise. Plans determine which platform capabilities are available to an organization. They do not determine an individual user's permissions within an incident or workspace.
Capabilities shared by every plan
Every HICSNow subscription supports an organization without limiting the number of users it may maintain. User access continues to depend on the person's workspace membership, facility assignments, administrative user group, and operational HICS Role.
Facility capacity differs by plan:
| Plan | Facility structure |
|---|---|
| Essentials | One facility |
| Professional | A system containing multiple facilities |
| Enterprise | A system containing multiple facilities |
An Essentials organization may assign any number of users to its single facility. Professional and Enterprise organizations may maintain multiple facilities and assign users across them.
How a new system begins
A newly created Professional or Enterprise organization begins with a system name and system address. The system identity is separate from the facilities that belong to it, so its address may differ from every facility address.
The organization may initially contain no facilities. Its Tenant Administrator can sign in with organization-wide administrative access and select Add facility to establish the first active care location. The Tenant Administrator does not need a facility assignment to perform this work. Adding the first active facility completes the organization's initial onboarding without replacing or changing the system address.
Essentials continues to begin as a single-facility organization rather than a system.
Every plan includes the administrative Facility location editor. Authorized administrators can locate the saved address, review an approximate result, open the location map, place or drag a custom pin, or enter numeric coordinates. A facility can still be saved when its location needs review or a location service is temporarily unavailable.
Facility location is separate from facility-scoped National Weather Service information. Weather remains included only with Professional and Enterprise.
| Capability | Essentials | Professional | Enterprise |
|---|---|---|---|
| Facility address lookup, location map, custom pin, and numeric fallback | Included | Included | Included |
| Facility weather alerts, current conditions, advisories, and forecasts | Not included | Included | Included |
When an Essentials organization is upgraded to Professional or Enterprise, its existing facility is retained as the system's primary facility and its current Tenant Administrator retains organization-wide administrative access. If the organization was previously downgraded from a system, its former system identity can be restored or a different system identity can be established. The Tenant Administrator can then add and manage additional facilities.
A facility may also join an existing Professional or Enterprise system through a controlled HICSNow administrative transfer. Its facility configuration and eligible facility-only history move with it, and it then uses the destination system's subscription capabilities. The former standalone workspace closes, but its client record and audit history remain retained rather than being deleted. Former standalone administrators receive facility-scoped access in the destination unless the destination system separately grants broader authority.
A facility can later be separated from a Professional or Enterprise system and established as its own Essentials client. If the facility previously had an individual HICSNow workspace, its retained workspace identity and original subdomain are restored. Otherwise, a new unique subdomain and administrator are established. Users whose primary facility is separated move with it and no longer retain access to the former system. Facility-only incident history moves to the Essentials client, while incidents involving other system facilities remain with the original system and preserve their historical facility context.
Active incident capacity
The approved incident-management difference between the plans is:
| Plan | Simultaneously active incidents |
|---|---|
| Essentials | One active incident at a time |
| Professional | Multiple active incidents |
| Enterprise | Multiple active incidents |
An incident involving several facilities is still one incident. Completed, canceled, and archived incidents do not count against the active-incident capacity, and an organization continues to retain its incident history.
Essentials organizations create facility incidents for their single facility. In Professional and Enterprise systems, an authorized Incident Commander may create either a facility incident for a facility where they hold the facility Role or a health-system incident when they hold the separate system-scoped Incident Commander Role. A health-system incident may include all active facilities or a selected set of facilities. It remains one system-owned incident and does not create child facility incidents or grant local facility command authority.
Essentials
An organization with the Essentials plan may manage one active incident at a time. Before another incident can be activated, the current active incident must be completed or canceled. The current development preview does not yet expose those incident-closure controls; they are planned as later authorized and auditable workflows.
Professional and Enterprise
Organizations with the Professional or Enterprise plan may manage multiple incidents at the same time. Each incident maintains its own exact facility or health-system scope, participant history, command assignment, and records.
Plan changes during active incidents
HICSNow does not automatically close incidents or delete incident information because of a plan change. If an organization moves to Essentials while more than one incident is active:
- the existing active incidents remain available for continued management;
- no incident is closed automatically;
- no incident history is deleted; and
- another incident cannot be activated until only one remains active or the organization's plan access changes again.
This behavior protects continuity during emergency operations.
Plan changes affecting facilities
HICSNow does not automatically delete, merge, hide, or deactivate facilities because of a plan change. If a system containing multiple facilities moves to Essentials:
- its existing facilities and historical records remain available;
- another facility cannot be added or reactivated while the organization is above the Essentials limit; and
- an authorized HICSNow Super Administrator must resolve the plan or facility structure intentionally.
Add-on modules and special access
Some capabilities may be offered through optional add-on modules, trials, pilots, promotions, or organization-specific agreements. An add-on can extend a base plan without changing its name. Only an authorized HICSNow Super Administrator can change a plan, add-on, or organization-specific capability.
Frequently asked questions
Do plans limit users?
No. HICSNow subscription plans do not use user-license limits.
Which plans support multiple facilities?
Professional and Enterprise allow an organization to operate as a system with multiple facilities. Essentials supports one facility.
Which plans include facility weather?
Professional and Enterprise include facility-scoped National Weather Service alerts and current observations. Essentials does not include the facility weather card or weather data access.
Which plans include facility location?
Essentials, Professional, and Enterprise all include facility address lookup, the administrative location map, custom pin placement, and numeric-coordinate fallback. Access still depends on the administrator's facility permissions.
Does a health-system incident count once for every participating facility?
No. A single incident that includes several facilities counts as one active incident.
Does a completed incident prevent Essentials from starting another?
No. Completed, canceled, and archived incidents remain in history but do not count as active incidents.
Can a Tenant Administrator change the subscription plan?
No. Only an authorized HICSNow Super Administrator can change subscription plans, add-on modules, or organization-specific capability settings.
Where can I see every difference between the three plans?
The complete capability comparison will be added here as the remaining plan definitions are approved.