When 911 is dialed, most organizations know that they need to deliver both the call and the caller’s location information to the appropriate Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP). In an IP-based communications network, this is achieved with E9-1-1 management appliances and call routing solutions.
As an added feature with many of these solutions, you can also notify internal security of a 911 call in progress, using screen pops, emails, and pre-recorded messages. Although these notifications provide enough basic information (extension #, location, and name) to alert security of a 911 call, they do not provide enough situational awareness for security to act on.
Without knowing the nature of the emergency, security personnel will not know how to respond appropriately.
How will they know if the safety of other employees is at risk?
How will they know to alert employee first-aiders?
If security calls back the employee that dialed 911, there is also no guarantee that this employee will be able to answer their phone. Three way call monitoring eliminates this unnecessary step of trying to figure out the gravity of the emergency and whether there’s an emergency at all.
In the case of a non-emergencies, not only will the call tie up the PSAP’s limited 911 lines but the caller will also not be able to receive the assistance he is looking for.