Operations

Intake forms

Fosterling provides public-facing forms for surrender, adoptions, foster interest, volunteer sign-up, and lost & found reports. Each form feeds directly into the corresponding part of your workflow -- no manual copying required.

AdminCoordinator

Available forms

Form	What it creates	Description
Surrender / Relinquishment	Found-animal draft	For owners giving up an animal. Creates a found-animal draft in the Lost & found hub for your team to review and convert.
Adoption application	Adoption application	General adoption interest form. Can also be linked to a specific animal from the gallery.
Foster interest	Foster home (pending)	For people who want to foster. Creates a foster home record in pending status for your approval.
Volunteer application	Volunteer application	For people who want to volunteer. Creates a volunteer application in the Applications tab.
Found-animal report	Found-animal draft	For members of the public who found a stray. Creates a found-animal draft.
Lost-pet report	Lost-pet case	For owners of lost pets. Creates an open lost-pet case in your Lost & found hub.

Finding your form links

Go to Forms in the main nav. Each form type has a shareable URL you can copy and post anywhere -- your website, social media, Linktree, etc.

Form URLs follow the pattern fosterling.io/your-rescue/[form-type]. They're public -- no login required.

Forms (main nav) -- form cards with response counts, share links, and a new-form card

Enabling and disabling forms

Each form has an enable/disable toggle in Settings > Intake & programs. Disabled forms return a friendly "Not currently accepting submissions" message to visitors. Use this to pause surrender intake during a transport week, for example.

Customizing form questions

Rescue planBuilding and editing custom form questions requires the Rescue plan or higher -- it's not included on the free Solo tier.

1
Go to Settings > Intake & programs and click the form you want to edit.
2
Click Edit questions. A builder shows all current questions.
3
Drag to reorder, click the pencil to rename, or click Add question to add a new one. Choose from: short text, long text, dropdown, checkbox, date, phone, file upload, or signature.
4
Mark questions as required or optional using the toggle on each question.
5
Click Save. Changes are live immediately.

The core fields on each form (name, email, animal description) can't be removed -- they're required for the workflow to function. You can add unlimited custom questions on top of them.

Drafting a form with AI

Rescue planRequires the Rescue plan or higher.

Go to Forms in the main nav and use the AI panel at the top instead of starting from a template. You've got two options:

Describe it -- type what the form should ask (or paste your existing questions) and AI turns that into editable fields.
Recreate an existing form -- upload a screenshot, photo, or PDF of a paper form you already use, and AI rebuilds it as an editable Fosterling form, including file-upload and signature fields where the original had them.

Either way, the draft opens in the same builder as a manually-created form -- review the fields, adjust anything that's off, and publish when you're ready.

Importing forms from other tools

Already collecting submissions somewhere else? Go to Forms > Imported and connect one of:

Jotform -- connect with your Jotform API key and form ID.
Google Forms -- sign in with Google and pick the form from a picker.
Typeform -- connect with a Typeform API token.

Once connected, new responses sync into Fosterling automatically, the same way responses from a native Fosterling form do.

Embedding a form on your website

There are two ways to put a Fosterling form on your website:

Direct link -- copy the form URL and link to it from a button on your site. Visitors land on a Fosterling-hosted page styled with your org's colors.
iFrame embed -- copy the embed snippet from Settings and paste it into your website's HTML. The form renders inline on your page.

Can someone submit a surrender form for a specific animal they want to give up?: Yes -- the surrender form asks for a description of the animal. Your team reviews it as a found-animal draft and can then run intake from there.
Do I get notified when a form is submitted?: Yes -- admins and coordinators receive an email notification for each submission. You can adjust notification preferences in Settings > Notifications.
Can I use my own adoption application form instead of Fosterling's?: Not directly -- Fosterling's application form is required to create applications that flow into the Adoptions hub. You can add as many custom questions as you need to it.
Are form responses stored somewhere I can export?: Yes -- go to the relevant hub (Adoptions, Volunteers, Lost & found) and use the CSV export button to download all responses.

Adoptions

Adoption applications from public forms

Lost & found

Found-animal and lost-pet form submissions

Volunteers

Volunteer applications

Public portal

Your adopter gallery links to forms