Chain of custody
One owner at every step, by name.
A file with no owner is a file waiting to be dropped. RoverDrop keeps a clear chain of custody over every packet: the crew is responsible until an office tech deliberately accepts it, responsibility can be reassigned by name, and every change is written to a record no one can quietly rewrite. At no point is the answer to “whose job is this now” unclear.
No account or email needed for the demo.
Shared responsibility is no responsibility
When files land in a shared inbox or a shared folder, they belong to everyone, which means they belong to no one. Two people each assume the other has it. A packet sits for a week. Nobody did anything wrong, exactly, and that is the problem: there was never a single person whose job it was.
Chain of custody fixes this by making ownership a fact, not an assumption. At every moment, exactly one named person is responsible for a packet. When that changes, it changes on purpose, and the change is recorded. The failure mode of “I thought you had it” stops being possible, because the packet always says who has it.
“Whose job is this now?”
That question should always have an obvious answer. A chain of custody makes sure it does, from the moment a crew submits to the moment the work is filed.
Accepting is the transfer. Downloading is not.
The single most important rule in the whole model: reading a packet and taking responsibility for it are different actions. An office tech can open and download files to check them without becoming responsible. Responsibility moves only when someone accepts, deliberately, with their name attached.
Submit
Crew ownsThe crew uploads and verifies the packet. From this instant the submitter is the responsible owner, and the packet is visibly waiting in the office queue.
Accept
Office ownsAn office tech accepts by name. This is the one act that transfers responsibility. Before it, the office can look but does not own; after it, the packet is theirs.
Reassign & file
Office ownsResponsibility can be passed to a specific colleague office-side, then the work is marked filed. Every hop is a named, timestamped entry in the custody log.
The record
An append-only custody log for every packet
Every packet carries its own history of custody: who held it, from when, and what caused the change. Entries are added, never edited or deleted, so the log is a record you can trust rather than a status that can be quietly overwritten.
- Frank FieldSubmitter
Jul 2 · 9:14a
Submitted packet
- Frank FieldSubmitter
Jul 2 · 9:40a
Office downloaded (no transfer)
- Dana OfficeOffice tech
Jul 2 · 10:02a
Accepted responsibility
- Sarah LeadOffice tech
Jul 2 · 11:15a
Reassigned to Sarah
- Sarah LeadOffice tech
Jul 2 · 4:20p
Marked filed
The custody log is one view of the same underlying events that make up the full audit trail. Custody answers “who is responsible;” the audit trail answers “what happened,” down to each view and download.
When custody has to hold up
Some fields treat custody as a legal matter, not a convenience. In land surveying, raw observations can end up in a boundary dispute years later, and being able to show an unbroken chain from the rover to the office is part of standing behind the work. This is part of the larger job of field-to-office file transfer, where custody, proof, and archive travel together.
To put this into practice, see how to assign ownership when field files reach the office and the submitted, accepted, filed handoff model.
Related
See it in motion
See responsibility change hands
Accept a packet in the demo and watch the custody log update with your name. Reassign it, file it, and see every step recorded. No account or email required.