No.  A client must be given a Household End Date in one household before they can be added to a different household.

If both individuals are in the same global household and they are enrolled in the same program simultaneously, only one of them can be specified as the primary client.

  NOTE: Contact your Foothold Customer Success & Advocacy team representative if you would like guidance on your households workflow.

To be sure that the individual is not duplicated in this instance and remains attached to the correct global household, you must collect Social Security Number information for household members.  Further, you must have a social security number recorded for the individual as part of his/her original record as an unadmitted global household member. 

  NOTE: If you do not see the SSN field when adding a household member (into which you can place all 9s in the event that you are not actually collecting the SSN), please contact the Help Desk for assistance.

To link two clients when they are both already members of individual households, first the client who is not the primary household client should be removed from (or disassociated from) the household he or she is currently in.  To do this, go to that client's Household Composition page, and from the "Global Household Composition" tab, click the client's name.  To remove the household member from the household as if they were never there, click the Delete checkbox that appears for each household stay.  When the page is saved, AWARDS displays the option to create a new household for the client or have him or her join an existing household.  Select the option to join an existing household and click CONTINUE, then search for the other household member and follow the prompts to add the client to that global household.

In the context of AWARDS a household (also referred to throughout AWARDS and Online Help as a "global household") is an affiliated group of clients that are not necessarily in the same program(s), and in fact some of them may not be enrolled in any program.  They are linked together in AWARDS by a global household ID. 

Whether or not a household is additionally defined as individuals who live together is up to the agency.  Some agencies choose to apply that to the definition, while others may simply consider a household to be people who are involved in other household members' lives.

The system allows for tracking unique start and end dates for all individual members of the household; however, for programs set to collect HMIS data elements, note that:

This depends on how each program defines a "household."  If a program still considers the spouse as part of the household, even though he or she might not be physically present, then we suggest putting an End Date on the history listing "Yes" for Living With Household, and entering a new history with "No" checked and a corresponding Start Date, equal to the End Date entered on the previous record.  The household member then remains an active member of the household, but is noted as a non-resident.

For example, if a household was formed 1/1/12 and the spouse was living with the household on that date, then moved out on 1/15/12, enter:

Yes - 1/1/12 - 1/15/12

No - 1/15/12 - present

Here there is no "gap" in household relation, and we can see the periods in which the spouse was living with the household, and not, without overriding historical information.

If a program considers the spouse to no longer be a member of the household when he or she moves out, then we suggest entering an End Date on the record.

Yes, there is an optional feature that Foothold can turn on behind-the-scenes that will enable users to collect this information for household members by redirecting them to an additional data entry page after household composition data entry has been completed for them.  To request that this optional feature be turned on in your AWARDS database, please contact the Help Desk for assistance.  Please reference cfg-house-race-ethnic in your request.

No.  A global household can be made up of a single person or a group of people admitted into a single program, several programs, or not admitted into any agency program.  When viewing the Household Composition page, the "Global Household Composition" tab reflects the full household structure, while the "Household Program Enrollment" tab only details those household members with an enrollment into that specific program.  So while household members may have varying program enrollments, as reflected in the "Household Program Enrollment" tab within each of those programs, the "Global Household Composition" looks the same across programs.

Yes, the "Self" designation on the Household Composition page's two tabs may be different based on the client through whose records you accessed the Household Composition feature.  Specifically:

  On the Global Household Composition tab - "Self" displays in the Relationship to [client] column to indicate the row of the client whose face sheet you are currently connected to (in other words, the client whose face sheet you accessed in order to navigate to the Household Composition feature).  As a result, if you navigate to this tab from the face sheets of different household members, the "Self" indicator will be different for each of those household members on the "Global Household Composition" tab.

  On the Household Program Enrollment tab - "Self" displays in the row of whoever is the primary client/head of household for a given program enrollment.  As a result, if you navigate to this tab from the face sheets of different household members, the "Self" indicator will indicate the program's primary client, regardless of the face sheet you enter from.

  If you're admitting a new household in its entirety - Begin in the Intake/Admission module and admit the client who will be labeled as the Head of Household. After the admission is complete, use the Household Composition button on the face sheet of that client to continue adding household members, and follow the prompts on that page to admit them. If you're unable to admit the entire household at once and you need to add another household member at a later date, see the next two bullets.

  HMIS programs - If you're adding or admitting new household members to an existing household - Begin on the face sheet of the Head of Household of the household to which the new members are being added. Use the Household Composition button there to continue adding household members, and follow the prompts on that page to admit them, if needed. Do not admit the new household members by starting at the Intake/Admission module and then linking them to the household, as that may cause more data to be captured for the new members than necessary.

  Non-HMIS programs - If you're adding or admitting new household members to an existing household - Begin on the face sheet of the Head of Household of the household to which the new members are being added. Use the Household Composition button there to continue adding household members, and follow the prompts on that page to admit them. Alternatively, you can begin at the Intake/Admission module and admit the household member, then follow the prompts to add them to the existing household.

In the event that a head of household leaves and is discharged from the program, you must first process that individual's discharge.  Once that has been done, you must create a client record for the new head of household by entering a referral record for him/her and processing his or her admission into the program.  There is no way to complete this process without discharging the family and re-admitting them with the new head.

Yes, in addition to the household member's demographics (name, gender, DOB, SSN) the following fields will be pre-populated on the admission form, based on the data entered for the primary client:  Housing Status, Primary Worker, Residence Prior to Program Entry, Homeless Duration, Episodes of Homelessness, Length of Stay at previous residence, Zip of last permanent address, Zip code quality, and Services Sought.

In order for this pre-population to occur, the household member's admission must be processed either a) from within the primary client's face sheet, Household Composition feature, by clicking the Create Admission icon on the "Global Household Composition" tab, or b) following the primary client's admission, choosing to add and immediately admit additional household members.

Each youth should be entered in his/her own household.  In this way, all elements required to be collected for youths by RHY will be visible for data collection in HMIS as each youth will be his/her own head of household.

This warning, displayed when you hover over the warning icon on the Household Composition feature's "Household Program Enrollment" tab, indicates that the enrollment dates for the household member in question prevent him/her from being made the primary client.  A primary client designation requires that the individual was present for the entire program enrollment.  If necessary you can use the Program History Corrections feature to adjust the program enrollment information for the client if his/her admission and discharge dates are not accurate.

Protections only apply to individuals once they are admitted.  As a result, household members are displayed on the "Global Household Composition" tab of the Household Composition feature in non-protected programs until they are admitted.  Once admitted to a protected program, they will cease to display to anyone that does not have program chart access permission for that protected program. 

Global households are not associated with programs.  Because this will often result in a global household including members that are enrolled in programs to which you do not have chart access, security features exist to limit the amount of data you see on those individuals.  Specifically, to make data more secure, DOB and SSN are hidden (****) by default unless/until the household member has an enrollment in the current program or another program you have chart access to.  To have the DOB and SSN of unadmitted household members display throughout your database, please contact the Help Desk to have this default feature removed.

  TIP: If you admit a client via Household Composition (using the Create Admission icon ), the previously hidden data will populate and the records will pair.  Additionally, if you enter a matching SSN and DOB in Intake/Admission, the client is paired with the existing household record. 

  TIP: Contact your Foothold Customer Success & Advocacy team representative if you would like guidance with your households workflow.