Annual 911 Report

2010

2010 Annual 911 Report

Ottawa Police Service

Communications Centre

P.O Box 9634

Station T

Ottawa, Ontario

K1G 6h5

Ottawapolice.ca

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2010 Annual 911 Report

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Annual 911 Report

A report on the yearly activity of the Ottawa 911 Bureau

In 2010, 9-1-1 call agents answered 260,433 calls representing a 12.4% increase compared to 2009 (+28 802 calls). The daily average of calls answered in 2010 was 713.

Service level performance has consistently improved year after year since 2002.

For 2010, the average service level achieved was 98.5 % with 11 out of 12

months over 98%.

Callers abandoned only 315 of all calls offered to 9-1-1 in 2010 (compared to 315 in 2009) equating to only 0.1% of the total calls offered (260,433). A continuous decrease in abandoned calls has been experienced over an eight year period, from a high of 5,351 (2.2%) out of 241,371 calls offered in 2000 to the 2007 low of 274 (0.1%) out of 210,873 calls offered. Most callers who decide to disconnect, typically do so once they hear the recorded announcement that plays at the 10-second interval if the call is yet to be answered. The recorded announcement plays during periods when call activity suddenly peaks.

Background

The 911 system was initially established by the former Regional Municipality of Ottawa Carleton in 1988 and has been

operated and managed by the Ottawa Police Service since that time. The partners in this system include the Ottawa Fire

Service, Ottawa Paramedic Service and police agencies operating within the geographical boundaries of the City of Ottawa.

The Enhanced 9-1-1 Primary Public Safety Answering Point (E911 PPSAP) operates from within the Communications

Centre of the Ottawa Police Headquarters, located at 474 Elgin Street. The centre is staffed through a rotation of

personnel working within the Communications Centre, who during the course of a working shift, rotate between police call

taking, radio dispatching and 9-1-1 call agent roles.

This system provides a pool of personnel fully conversant with 9-1-1 and providing the ability to temporarily augment 9-1-

1 with additional communicators during times of high demand. Fifteen of the 117 communicator positions within the

Communications Centre complement receive funding in order to operate the PPSAP.

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Performance objectives

The service level objective in place at 9-1-1 in Ottawa is to have 97% of all calls answered within six seconds, once received by the Ottawa Police phone system. The Bell Canada system requires approximately five seconds to process a call, which once delivered to the Ottawa Police Service, is processed by an Automatic Call Distributor system and directed to the first available agent. Incoming 9-1-1 calls are forced, which means that an available call taker is automatically alerted to the incoming call by an audible tone in their headset followed by an instant connection. Not only was the service level objective met in every month in 2010, it was exceeded. It also increased in 10 of 12 months compared to 2009. This high objective far exceeds those set by other Primary PSAP’s in Ontario (i.e. Toronto Police Service- 90% of all calls answered within 10 seconds, Peel Regional Police Service- 95% of all calls answered in 6 seconds, OPP- 95% within 12 seconds). In comparison, the National Emergency Number Association (NENA USA) call answering standard is to answer 90% of all 9-1-1 calls within 10 seconds during the busy hour and answer 95% of all 9-1-1 calls within 20 seconds.

Children’s 911 award

The 911 children’s awards were held

for the 12th year at City Hall on May

8, 2010. Ten children were

recognized for their use of the 9-1-1

system during an emergency.

Many city officials including the

Mayor, various city councilors and

the leadership of the tri-services

were present to meet with the

children and present them with their

certificates.

This award is an annual event held by the city to recognize children 12 years of age or less who have used the 911 system

effectively in emergency situations. Nominations are received throughout the year from the various partner agencies and

then reviewed by a selection group.

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911 Public Complaints

The Ottawa Police received 6 public complaints in 2010 regarding the 911 service (compared to 8 in 2009 and 9 in 2008).

Three complaints centered on the actions of the 911 operators. It was determined that their actions were appropriate in

two of the incidents while the third identified a requirement for a messaging component to staff members. Out of the two

complaints that were technology related, one required a follow-up with external partners to remedy. One of the

complaints focused on quantity of responders to a call and it was determined that all current policies were followed.

Any issues brought forward by the public that relate to a Secondary PPSAP are forwarded when received to the

appropriate downstream agency. Complainants are contacted in most cases to review the circumstances and information

exchange that occurred with the respective call agent as well as 9-1-1 procedures. Quality customer service is a key

element of 9-1-1 performance review, in-house training, and/or other means used to identify service improvements and

maintain superior standards.

911 Public Complaints

No Received Nature of complaint Outcome

1. April 911 caller referred to Police 10 digit Emergency number after receiving a call for a person in distress and being told that the call could not be traced.

A review identified that options were available to perform traces in the specified situation.

Communication sent to all sectional members to ensure that all possibilities be attempted in these matters. The actions of the call-taker did not adversely affect the call’s outcome.

2. April Caller reported receiving a call back from 911 on his wireless device following a probable accidental misdial but that the call logs on the device did not show any outbound calls to 911.

Investigation identified that emergency calls made from that model number device do not record 911 calls in the call log.

3. April Incorrect address received from 911 system Investigation determined that outdated information was present in the database of a third party provider.

Information updated.

4. April Complaint received indicating that the 911 operator was disrespectful toward the caller.

Investigation determined that the complaint was based on perceptions after the call and not actually from the interaction with the 911 operator. Complainant satisfied with result.

5. June Complaint received regarding the amount of resources sent to a call.

Review deemed that the 9-1-1 response was appropriate.

Scope of response within required procedures of all tri-services.

6. May 911 caller complained that a request for anonymity was not respected.

Investigation determined that officers canvassed multiple residences including the complainant’s.

911 staff advised to ensure that responding officers are advised over the air of anonymity requests.

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Staffing levels

For operational security reasons the amount of agents on duty remains unpublished although it can be stated that the

average number of agents on duty in 2010 exceeded the minimums stated in the 911 Service Level Agreement by one

agent.

Yearly Activity

On July 19th, 2010 the 911 Service Level Agreement between the City of Ottawa and the Ottawa Police Service was renewed

after a substantial amount of cooperation between both organizations. The agreement provides updates on many areas of

the partnership between the City and the Ottawa Police regarding the 911 service. It also paves the way for future

cooperation between all City Partners in order to go meet future challenges.

One area now addressed within the agreement is Business Continuity and the Ottawa Police Communications Centre continues to focus on this area in cooperation with the Business Continuity section in order to ensure a reliable 911 service to the citizens of Ottawa

2010 marked a seldom seen milestone within the

communications centre community. Janet Meyers, one of the

platoon supervisors within the communications centre retired

after 35 years of service. Apart from the expected wishes from

her colleagues, Janet also received a visit of the Ottawa Police

Association representatives and the Chief of Police. She is

pictured to the left with Chief White, Inspector Sterling

Hartley and Staff Sergeant Murray Knowles.

In 2010 the Telecom Regulatory policy CRTC 2009-40 came into force requiring (by February 2010) all wireless carriers

provide location information from wireless devices calling 911. In order to ensure that this capability was available both

the wireless providers and 911 centers had to perform upgrades to their systems.

The method used by the wireless carriers to provide this new information came in the form of two distinct messages from

their system providing information. Historically, one message would provide the information on the caller to the 911

centers. The new methodology added a second automatic message being sent shortly after the call was initiated that

included the GPS information.

In order to receive the new GPS information, the computer assisted dispatch (CAD) system used by both the Police and

Fire service had to receive a temporary software patch since a permanent method to deal with the additional information

was unavailable from the product vendor.

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In 2010 an increase of 12.4% was seen in phone calls received at 911. When

reviewing the amount of calls actually down streamed to the various agencies

it was observed that the data was fairly similar to the 2009 data (see below).

Percentage of phone calls down streamed

Ottawa

Paramedic

Ottawa

Fire

OPP Quebec

911

RCMP

2010 23.9% 3.2% 2.8% 0.6% 0.07%

2009 26.9% 3.5% 2.9% 0.7% 0.08%

The call statistics in the above chart illustrate the 911 phone calls transferred

directly to each agency and do not address any requests for service made for

a tiered response or have a direct correlation to the calls for service for each

organization.

Further, when reviewing the source of the calls received at 911 in recent years, the upward trend of wireless device use is

apparent. Wireless devices accounted for just over 40% of the calls in 2005 and have grown steadily to almost 58% in

2010. Additionally, the data from 2010 shows a continued decrease from all non wireless sources as can be shown below.

Percentage of phone calls received from wireless devices

2006 2007 2008 2009 2010

40.4% 43.7% 46.6% 50.7% 57.5%

2009-2010 comparative results of the source of phone calls received

Wireless

devices

Residential Commercial/

Government

Payphone Other*

6.8% increase 1.8% decrease 1.1% decrease 3.3% decrease 10% decrease

*Includes multi-party lines, data calls, etc

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911 bureau call activity data

Average Time spent per 911 phone call (seconds)

2006 2007 2008 2009 2010

98 98 95 91 94

Yearly Service levels achieved

2006 2007 2008 2009 2010

97% 97.9% 98.3% 98.2% 98.5%

Monthly service levels

Year Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Year

2010 98.8 98.7 99 98.5 98.3 97.5 98.5 98.6 98.5 98.6 98.9 98.8 98.5

2009 98.6 98.6 98.8 97.9 98.5 97.6 97.9 98.0 97.9 98.2 98.2 98.5 98.2

Source of phone calls received

Cellular 57.5%

Residential 24.1%

Commercial/Government 14.3%

Public Payphones 2.52%

Other* 1.55%

Includes multi-party lines, data calls, etc

2006, 207159

2007, 210599

2008, 218103

2009, 231299

2010, 260433

911 phone calls per year answered

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