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This page summarizes the PRL reporting process, what report submitters need to do and what they can expect to happen.

Overview

The reporting process has four phases:

Planning
Report Creation
Report Submission
Report Processing

At the beginning of the report year determine the type of report appropriate to your business and decide how to collect the data required for that report type. At the end of the report year create a pesticide report from the data collected using a format that matches the appropriate form type(s) for the business that you are in.

Next choose one of the submission methods to use and assemble the report files for your business into a single submission. Then enter or verify the contact information to be submitted with the report and submit your pesticide report.

Report processing for all electronic reports is done at the Pesticide Reporting Service Bureau. The service bureau will send you an email when your report has been received and another one if your report passes validation. We will also send you an email if your report requires correction. The applicators and/or sales business(es) included on your report will not be credited with filing until your report has passed validation.

Planning and Report Creation

Pesticide applicators and businesses will use form 26 and 26A, while pesticide sales businesses will primarily use forms 25 and 27 and sometimes form 26 . For more information see Decide Which Forms to Use.

There is no required way to collect or enter the PRL data into software, but the files submitted to us must conform to the form types developed by the DEC. Some pesticide management software packages have the capability to export a formatted PRL report. If you use one of these packages, be sure to export the report in either text or Excel (or other spreadsheet) format, not as PDF. If your software cannot export a PRL report, but can export to a spreadsheet, you can then paste the data into one of our software options.

If you do not use pesticide management software that stores the PRL data or that allows you to export the data, download and install one of our software options. For more information on the various options see Which Software Option Should I Use?

Your PRL report must conform to the layouts of the forms (25, 26, 26A, 27) that have been developed for the different types of pesticide businesses. We may not accept reports which do not use one of these standard layouts.

Data Entry Guidelines

Do not use ditto marks or equivalent notation on any of the four form types.
Each required column should contain a single value (one EPA number, one street address etc).
Do not add extra columns to the files that you send us; report only columns that are on one of the four form types.
Consult the Data Dictionary for the description of any column you have questions about. For example, the units of measure and county columns require specific abbreviations or codes.

Report Submission

After you are finished entering your pesticide data, you need to prepare the report for submission. Please keep the following in mind

Submit all your data for the entire year at one time. Do not send us the data incrementally, such as by the month or week.
Send all the files that are part of your report in one submission. For example, do not send a paper form 26A to the DEC in Albany and an electronic form 26 to the PRL Service Bureau.
Do not send multiple copies of your report using different submission methods. We monitor all reporting channels (PRL software upload, web site upload, email and paper) and will get the report through any of them.
Minimize the number of files of the same form type you submit. Multiple files of the same type increase the chance that your report will fail validation. That is because we use an error threshold based on the percentage of error records in the file. A smaller file has a lower error threshold.

See Submitting Your Electronic Report for information on the various options for sending us your report.

What to Expect When You Submit Your Report

Depending on what submission method you use, the following will happen when you send us your report:

Upload from a PRL Software option or the web site: When the upload is complete, a page will display with your submission number and a list of files we received. We will also send you an email with the same information. The email will go to whatever email address was entered into the contact email field in the software. If no email arrives within an hour or so, you may want to contact us.
Email: We will send you an email with your submission number and a list of the files we received.. The email will go to the email address that was used to send us the files. This email will usually be sent within one business day. If no email arrives within that time frame, you may want to contact us.

If you are having trouble using one of the submission methods, try another method or contact us. Do not continue to click the Upload or Submit button if it does not seem to be working.

Retain this initial email as confirmation that you submitted your report. Please use the submission number it contains in all correspondence about your report with the PRL Service Bureau.

Report Processing

Your report must be validated by the PRL Service Bureau before it is accepted. After we process the report we will either send you a request for a corrected report or a report acceptance email.

You will not be credited with reporting for the year until we send you a report acceptance email.

If your report is accepted, review the list of applicators (or the name of the pesticide sales business) to make sure that all the applicators or businesses have been included. If your report was rejected, we will send you an email describing the issues with the report. Please make these corrections and email the corrected report to us at prlsupport@nysprl.com. Be sure to include your submission number. See Correcting Rejected Reports for more information on making report corrections.