911 Calls

BillRobinson · Jun 5, 2012

A little off-base from PLC's but the telecom world is a close cousin, especially when your programming IP phones. In your experience how do you deal with 911 calls on a phone system that requires you to dial a number to get an outside line?

In my current situation the phone system requires you to dial 9 to get an outside line, any other 4-digit number gets you another office phone.

Should you dial 9-1-1 to get 911 or should you dial 9-9-1-1?

The answer I got from the phone supplier is that you should dial 9-9-1-1 because false 911 calls are common when people dial long distance and hit a second 1 by mistake. My belief is this is just plain wrong, in a emergency situation you are instinctively programmed to dial 9-1-1, not 9-9-1-1. Plus people unfamiliar with the system would not know that 9 gives you an outside line.

Any comments? How do you see 911 handled in large phone systems?

Helliana · Jun 5, 2012

This is a very common problem. One solution that i have seen used places is place a sticker on a obvious part of the phone that says: IN CASE OF EMERGENCY, DIAL 9-9-1-1.

I'm pretty sure most large phone systems have this issue.

Steve Bailey · Jun 5, 2012

I don't think there is single, one-size-fits-all solution. I personally know of several large multi-building industrial campuses where they have their own first responders. At those locations the employees are trained to call the in-house security rather than 911. The security dispatcher will send the plant first responders directly to the location of the emergency and can also decide whether or not to call in additional resources.

Plus, the plant security people have a better knowledge of the layout of the facility than the 911 dispatcher could hope to, and will generally get help to where it's needed much sooner than would be the case if you called 911. Also, if plant security has called in outside resources, there won't be any delay at the security gate when the outside responders arrive.

Earthscape · Jun 5, 2012

There are actually multiple problems especially if you're using it on a Metropolitan network, but in the event that the number only can be dialed and no conversation had with the dispatcher, its important for them to know where to send the police. I've always had a dedicated POTS line, and program the PBX for 911 to automatically drop the handset to that POTS and dial. This will most of the time assure that even if no conversation is had, that the cops will atleast show up at the right address, and not the IP Demarc or G4 location.

widelto · Jun 5, 2012

I do not know where the number 911 comes from, but here we use 123 instead. It´s easier and faster to dial.

Helliana · Jun 5, 2012

widelto said:
I do not know where the number 911 comes from, but here we use 123 instead. It´s easier and faster to dial.

Also more commonly dialed by children playing with the phone

RussB · Jun 5, 2012

I believe that an internal phone system should have 9-1-1 programmed in it to be used if desired. It should then be programmable by those responsible for the internal system to have a forwarding number to be dialed out which could be 9-1-1 or anything else that makes sense. The system should then pick up an unused line or even take one being used if need be then dial. With today's software based systems there is no reason this can not be done. IMHO

BillRobinson said:
A little off-base from PLC's but the telecom world is a close cousin, especially when your programming IP phones. In your experience how do you deal with 911 calls on a phone system that requires you to dial a number to get an outside line?

In my current situation the phone system requires you to dial 9 to get an outside line, any other 4-digit number gets you another office phone.

Should you dial 9-1-1 to get 911 or should you dial 9-9-1-1?

The answer I got from the phone supplier is that you should dial 9-9-1-1 because false 911 calls are common when people dial long distance and hit a second 1 by mistake. My belief is this is just plain wrong, in a emergency situation you are instinctively programmed to dial 9-1-1, not 9-9-1-1. Plus people unfamiliar with the system would not know that 9 gives you an outside line.

Any comments? How do you see 911 handled in large phone systems?

Johnster · Jun 5, 2012

Every large office/building/military-base/power plant had a sticker on the phone and a number other than 911 that you had to dial in an emergency. Its not unconventional to require someone to dial something other than 911 if that are part of a large system.

Christoff84 · Jun 5, 2012

We've done as was suggested above, just put a sign up that says dial 9-9-1-1 in case of emergency. What are you going to do if someone calls an area code like 116? 9-1-1-6 would go to the 911 dispatcher.

CheezyMane13 · Jun 5, 2012

Christoff84 said:
We've done as was suggested above, just put a sign up that says dial 9-9-1-1 in case of emergency. What are you going to do if someone calls an area code like 116? 9-1-1-6 would go to the 911 dispatcher.

No area codes exist that start with numbers 1**

http://www.bennetyee.org/ucsd-pages/area.html

BillRobinson · Jun 5, 2012

Christoff84 said:
We've done as was suggested above, just put a sign up that says dial 9-9-1-1 in case of emergency. What are you going to do if someone calls an area code like 116? 9-1-1-6 would go to the 911 dispatcher.

I was thinking that maybe changing the dial out prefix to 8 or 0 would solve this.

The Plc Kid · Jun 5, 2012

Any IP PBX system worth it's salt should let you pass 911 codesd directly to a outside line without a 9 prefix. You can do this on cisco any avaya I know.

As a previos poster said you can drop that extension directly to a POTS line when the 911 code is passed. You can also write a custom route to send it to a outside line when you are using a SIP trunck or T1.

Who is your PBX supplier BTW? You may want to dig a little deeper because you should be able to do this on any decent system.

We direct out 911 and we are on a cisco 7900 system.

MasterBlaster · Jun 5, 2012

What I did was program a system-wide speed dial button to dial 9911, and label is in red. Another system-wide speed dial button sounded the plant-wide fire alarm, and automatically opened (and held) the front gate open to ease the access of emergency vehicles. We are equipped with Knox Boxes, but much faster if they don't have to stop and use the key.

todster · Jun 6, 2012

We use a system similar to what Steve described. The security desk is notified and security makes the call. 9-911 can also be used but callback and location id can be an issue if 911 is dialed directly. Another issue with direct dialing 911 from a pbx is what if the caller misdialed and hit 911 instead of 9-41x-xxxx. It could tie up the call center with a misdial. There is a way to make 911 work and dial directly from a PBX and allow it to distinguish between a 911 and a 9-11x-xxxx. Personally, I'd rather have security or a designated individual handle the call and direct the response team to the correct location.

Christoff84 · Jun 6, 2012

We've had nuisance 911 calls before, it's such a pain becuase even if you hang up or talk to them, they still have to send the police, and we have to tour them through the facility every single time to make sure there isn't someone hidden somewhere.

911 Calls

BillRobinson

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Helliana

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Steve Bailey

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Earthscape

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widelto

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Helliana

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RussB

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Johnster

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Christoff84

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CheezyMane13

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BillRobinson

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The Plc Kid

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MasterBlaster

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todster

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Christoff84

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