The South African Police Service (SAPS) has ignored a second offer by call centre solutions company Customer Service Engineering (CSE) to assist with boosting the efficiency of 10111 centres - free of charge.
CSE owner Paddy Coleman says the company decided to offer its help in light of various issues and complaints around 10111, and since there seems to be no clarity about what the actual problem is.
He says he made the first offer about five years ago when he was the victim of an armed robbery and received no help as a result of his calls to 10111.
“We lined up other vendors to get together and address the issues and that didn't go anywhere.”
His most recent offer was made in October through media collaboration initiative Lead SA, but it received no response either.
Misguided standards?
Ministry of police spokesperson Zweli Mnisi says it's possible the wrong people within the ministry were approached with the offer. “When people pitch for business through media, it's problematic.”
Mnisi also says it's possible that the offer went through the right people, but the company was not up to standard. “We can't just let anyone come in here.”
“Increasing the efficiency of 10111 through this offer is of benefit to the police and more importantly to the communities they serve. We need to appreciate the fact that there are private companies out there willing to assist and step forward.”
Simple maths
Coleman says the initial problem with 10111 was that each police station had a small room with about five people where 10111 calls were routed, depending on the caller's location.
“It's pretty simple. If you want the phone to be answered, you've got to be able to answer. So someone in the call centre has to be doing nothing so they can answer. One or two people out of the five at least have to be doing nothing.”
He explains that a central call centre was needed to better the odds of having someone available to take calls.
“If you pool 100 people, you still only need one or two people doing nothing and then only 1% or 2% of agents have to be free at a time, rather than around 50%.”
Coleman explains this is the principle of pooling efficiency and the whole motivation of building the R600 million 10111 centre was based on this principle.
“We knew they needed a central centre and, when they were building the one in Midrand, we were happy.”
Second attempt
“So when someone comes in and says he's going to put cellphone numbers on vehicles, he's breaking the system and making a very serious mistake.”
Coleman refers to the new provincial police commissioner lieutenant-general Mzwandile Petros' announcement in September that all police vehicles would be branded with cellphone numbers so that citizens could call local police instead of 10111.
“From an engineer's perspective, it's just a bad idea. In that case, everyone is calling a single number and they're going to get a busy line. As a professional, I got alarmed because this will exacerbate the low response problem.”
Putting cellphone numbers on vehicles violates basic mathematical principles and Coleman says that's when he made his second offer through Lead SA.
“They have the machine in place already. We wanted to go in and help tweak it so that the system works efficiently.”
Last chance
Coleman emphasises that he did not offer to go in and actually fix the problem, but rather to consult and offer CSE's resources free of charge.
He says the Midrand centre is modern, well-equipped and has state-of-the-art technology. “So it's not a question of us trying to go in and sell something.
“We would just go in and determine what they need to do, how they need to do it, how many people they need at certain times of day and what the procedure is when calls are answered.”
Coleman says a full analysis could turn the system around. “They've done the 80%. They've built the sophisticated centre. So when the commissioner spoke about numbers on vehicles, I had to put my hand up and say: 'Please don't break it. It's fixable.'
“Over five years, this was my second offer to do free work on 10111 and I have heard nothing. We've got a business to run and so we won't keep chasing up the offer.”
Emergency directory
Releasing cellphone numbers of individual police officers and generals may be the new route taken in terms of community safety, according to the ministry of police.
Police officials were asked by national police commissioner Bheki Cele to give out their cellphone numbers at a public meeting with the Soshanguve community last month, after several complaints about 10111.
“We are in the process of printing out a national directory so all citizens will have access to the numbers of generals and other officials,” says Mnisi.
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