911 Answer Times: Why some call centers are slower

When it comes to the arrival of first responders at the scene of a crash or a crime, much of the focus is placed on “response times”, the time it takes an officer to arrive at the scene.

However, even before the response time clock starts, the “answer time” clock is running.

Answer time is the amount of time it takes a call taker or dispatcher to pick up the phone once the call arrives at the call center.

Although answer times are measures in seconds, while response times can often be measured in minutes, any first responder will confirm that even seconds can mean the difference between life and death.

And it turns out the difference between area agencies when it comes to answer times is pretty significant.

In September alone, nearly 28,000 were made to 911 centers across El Paso County, which is more than 900 calls a day.

The largest of the call centers within the El Paso Teller County 911 Authority is run by the City of Colorado Springs, followed by El Paso County, which answers calls from everyone else, except those at Fort Carson and Peterson.

The 911 Authority not only trains each dispatcher, but provides the equipment a dispatcher needs.

Each terminal costs roughly $50,000, which is paid for by a small fee added to the bill of each phone line in the area.

However, 911 Authority spokesperson Ben Bills says each city or county decides for itself how many employees it needs to handle 911 calls.

El Paso County has maintained an average answer time between 5 and 6 seconds, just under 2 rings, since 2014.

“We try to maintain those numbers for each shift, each day,” says Natalie Sosa, a former dispatcher who is now a spokesperson for the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office.

According to Sosa, the busiest time of day is between 2pm and 5pm, with car wrecks, disturbances, and medical calls being the most common.

“When someone is calling 911, they are calling because they are having a life or death emergency,” says Sosa.

The National Emergency Number Association sets the standards for answer times.

NENA recommends 90% of all calls be answered in the first ten seconds.

El Paso County meets that standard, with an average answer time of 5.11 seconds in September.

The City of Pueblo barely misses it, with an average time of 13 seconds in 2018.

The City of Colorado Springs is even farther away, with an average answer time of 21.47 seconds in September.

However, 21 seconds is actually an improvement from 33 seconds back in October of 2016, and 36 seconds in both August and September of 2015.

Public Safety Communication Manager Renee Henshaw says currently, just over half of all 911 calls made in Colorado Springs are answered in ten seconds or less.

“It’s pretty consistent around there, anywhere between 50 and 60 percent we are averaging,” she says.

The reason for the longer answer times at the Colorado Springs call center is the lack of dispatchers.

It receives four times as many calls as El Paso County, with not even two times the staff.

And unlike the response time issue which involves a lack of money in the budget to hire more officers, the answer time issue is a hiring issue.

There’s money to fill many more positions, but the City simply can’t keep up with the turnover.

On average, a public safety dispatcher leaves the job within two and a half years, due to the stress of the job and often difficult work hours.

At the time KRDO visited the city’s call center, 22 of the 96 positions were vacant, with only 8 workers going through training to fill them.

Henshaw describes the situation as a vicious cycle, because the lack of additional staff makes it even harder on the existing staff, making them even more likely to quit.

“We do require them to work a lot of overtime, to fill a minimum staffing level, to make sure hat the service that we’re providing to the community does not drop below a certain service level,” says Henshaw.

Another reason the turnover is high is the “secondary trauma” or emotional stress from handling so many calls for deadly wrecks, deadly crimes, suicides, and other dramatic events.

“You hear those screams, you hear those gunshots over the phone,” explains Henshaw, “we have people that have had people kill themselves on the phone while they are with the calltaker, and it’s very difficult to separate that and not take that home and not internalize it.”

Henshaw hopes to lower the city’s average answer time of 21 seconds.

However, she also refuses to hire people that aren’t uniquely qualified for such a demanding job.

In Part 2 of our special report, find out just how often dispatchers take accidental or intentional calls that don’t involve an emergency at all, and how they are required to deal with each of those calls.

If you’re interested in becoming a dispatcher for the City of Colorado Springs, click here to learn more.