Accidents happen! This is a fact of life, but how we react to them is the important issue, and this is true of both personal and industrial incidents. The difference is often that industrial accidents are predictable and therefore appropriate responses can be defined before they happen. This is particularly true of hazardous type industries, such as chemical manufacturing, mining and transporting or storing of hazardous materials. The emergency services industry such as fire, ambulance, security etc. can also predict the situations they could face, and can therefore plan their responses.
A large part of planning a response is the use of resources including people. What sort of skills are required for a certain situation? Which people possess those skills? How many are required? Which skills or people need to arrive first? Do other services such as hospitals need to be informed? Which of the people are available for immediate response? (They may be on leave or off-duty or live too far away). And lastly of course, how do we contact them?
This last question is typically answered by using some sort of manual call-tree, where a few normally well trained people sit on the phone calling numbers from a paper list and relaying information and instructions. Keeping track of who has been called, who is going to respond and how long they will take to arrive, is a nightmare! Some people are missed out and some are called more than once, to say nothing of getting through to wrong numbers, either because the list is out-of-date, or the number was mis-dialled. Apart from this, skilled people are being tied-up doing a mundane job instead of being used to combat the emergency.
Another approach used by some companies, is to send a pager message to groups of people who then have to phone in for instructions or jump in their car to attend site. Not only does this lead to frustration when the alarm turns out to be false or a particular skill is not needed this time, but it also seems to cause a large number of pagers to suffer from a flat battery! No one has any idea how many people will respond or how long they will take to arrive, plus, if the emergency site is not the same each time, a team of people is necessary again to man the phones and give instructions.
The vast majority of these calls are routine because they can be defined in advance as to who to call, what to say and what questions to ask, and can therefore be automated.
A system called The Communicator has been specifically designed to automate these routine calls and free-up your personnel to handle the non-routine communications. The net result is a better co-ordinated and effective response to any emergency situation.
Not only does The Communicator automate the routine calls, it does it a lot faster than manual methods. A 12 line system can contact as many as 100 people in 10 minutes; 10 times faster than a human being can manage! Not only is The Communicator a lot faster than people, it is also much more reliable. While people often make mistakes under pressure, The Communicator always dials the correct number and never forgets to call anyone or to take notes.
These notes can provide comprehensive reports on everything that happened during an emergency callout, as well as allowing you to see the progress as it happens. As people respond you can update the emergency plans to cater for the unexpected, and best of all, you don`t have to wait until they arrive before you know whether your callout reached everyone.
On top of all this The Communicator keeps track of multiple telephone numbers per person, when individuals are available for callout and which skills they possess. Based on this information The Communicator automatically selects who to call, at which number and logs whether they can respond and they will arrive.
Responding well to emergency situations is critical both in the cost of property and lives. The Communicator will ensure that all required personnel are brought in to deal with the incident quickly and efficiently.
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