Average 10111 response time a shocking 42 minutes, says DA

[rpm]

The Minister of Police has revealed shocking data on 10111 call
centres, showing that it takes an average of 42 minutes to dispatch
a unit to a call and for the dispatched unit to then respond. This
has been revealed in response to a parliamentary question that I
posed to him. Nationwide, it takes on average 20 minutes to
dispatch a unit to a call and a further 22 minutes for the
dispatched unit to respond. To say that this is a systematic
service delivery failure is an understatement of note - the fact is
that the ANC government continues to fail miserably in delivering
this crucial service to South Africans.

The situation is exceptionally serious in the Eastern Cape,
where in Mthatha for instance the reply states that it takes 327
minutes (almost 6 hours) to dispatch a unit to a call, and another
75 minutes for the unit to respond. In Port Elizabeth there is an
average 50 minute wait for the unit to be dispatched and for a
response; in Queenstown it takes 54 minutes alone for the unit to
be dispatched. The situation is also extremely serious in the North
West, where a response time of up to four hours has been recorded.

The reply further revealed that, out of the 20 call centres
nationwide, only 3 have the staff complement required to operate at
full capacity. All except Gauteng (12%) and Phuthaditjhaba in the
Free State (full capacity) are at least 20% understaffed, with the
highest vacancy rate being 85% in Mpumalanga.

The information provided raises some serious questions as to
what is really going on at some of these call centres. The
Queenstown call centre had a R331 000 budget overrun (equivalent to
a 45% budget overrun), 8 more staff members than required for
optimal functioning and yet only answered 3615 calls last year. If
one divides the total number of calls per person, it is equivalent
to 1 call every 3 days per staff member. What is even more
incredible is that the average time for the call centre to dispatch
a unit was 54 minutes - almost a full hour and at this very same
call centre, a caller waited 15 minutes for the phone to be
answered. This is nothing short of chronic service delivery failure
and some serious explaining needs to be done.

Other significant information in this reply includes:

* The Mthatha call centre in the Eastern Cape's total
expenditure for 08/09 was R1 406 721 and they received 5415 calls.
The expenditure versus call rate, makes this the most expensive
(and most inefficient) centre at R260 per call. This is in contrast
to the Polokwane call centre, which reported expenditure of R311
633 and received 334 272 calls in the same period, equivalent to
R0.93 per call.

* The Northern Cape call centre does not have the adequate
equipment to be able to generate statistics. The statistics, if
available, would most likely be quite appalling considering the 68%
vacancy rate at the call centre.

* Mpumalanga's three call centres are not fully operational and
have the highest vacancy rate of 85%. Despite this, the three call
centres spent almost R2m in 2008/2009.

A full copy of the reply, including data for each province, is
available upon request from jo@da.org.za

In addition to all of this, we will submit further parliamentary
questions to obtain a more detailed breakdown of the total call
waiting times. The data provided in this reply suggests that most
call centres pick up calls within less than a minute, yet earlier
this year the Auditor General revealed that a total of 100 739
calls had been abandoned during 2008/09, and that more than 50,000
had been abandoned while in a call queue. It is difficult to
reconcile the Department's parliamentary reply with the AG's data.

It is particularly essential now that the Police Department
properly implements the Automated Vehicle Location (AVL) policy. At
a SCOPA hearing in July this year MPs heard that roughly 12,000
SAPS vehicles still have not been fitted with these systems, which
link vehicles to the call centres. Parliament also heard that only
the Western Cape and Gauteng had centrally monitored AVL systems.
These AVLs are intended to assist in effectively dispatching
vehicles and the fact that not all vehicles are fitted with AVLs,
and not all provinces are centrally monitored, is clearly hindering
the optimal functioning of the call centres.

I will be writing to the chairperson of the Portfolio Committee
on Police this week to request that the police commissioner be
asked to appear before the committee in order to explain these
serious shortcomings, as well as the underspending and overspending
highlighted in this report, and his plans to remedy this.

[Blaze786]

Pathetic! Service Delivery I think not. The ANC are useless.

[Killove]

1 call every 3 days (averaged out), yet they still take 54 minutes to dispatch someone, or 15 minutes to answer a call.

What's the point?

Really would love it if one of their houses was being broken into, and they had to call one of these offices for help.

"Your call is important to us, please hold!"

[DreamKing]

anc = fail

always!

if you want to say someone is useless -> you are so anc!
if you want to say someone is annoying! -> you are very anc!
if you want to say someone is an idiot! -> you are such an anc!
if you want to condemn anyone without proper description -> you just like anc!

the word anc will soon be in Oxford dictionary.

anc - the newest decription of failure. (Achievement Never Conquest)

[Balstrome]

anc = fail

always!

if you want to say someone is useless -> you are so anc!
if you want to say someone is annoying! -> you are very anc!
if you want to say someone is an idiot! -> you are such an anc!
if you want to condemn anyone without proper description -> you just like anc!

the word anc will soon be in Oxford dictionary.

anc - the newest decription of failure. (Achievement Never Conquest)

Sorry you're wrong.. ANC = African National Congress (that says it all)

[DreamKing]

Sorry you're wrong.. ANC = African National Congress (that says it all)

someone will call you "racist" sooner or later.

[Korn1]

Hey don't you get another number for the flying squad or am I wrong lol? If it does have a different number can you give me the one for Sandton

[PeterCH]

You need to call the Premium Flying Squad number to get quick response.

[R/SGT]

FYI

10111 is radio control they control all the vechiles in an area and will despatch them based on the complaint

Flying squad is only despatched for Alpha complaints(In progress murder/ h/braeking robbery etc)

Station shift vechiles will respond to all complaints regardless

Complaints are classified as follows
Alpha - In progress priority complaints
Bravo - Occurred
Charlie - Attempted

Response time will depend on a number of factors, such as
- Vechiles available
- Number of complaints issued to each vechile
- Priority of compalints (A murder will be a higher priority than an House breaking occured
Time it takes for the vecchile to complete a complaint (Murder = 6+ hours / H/B = 3 hours / Drunk driver 5+ hours etc)

With regard to the response time, they need to break it down according to the priority of each complaint in order to give a clearer picture.

[Korn1]

FYI

10111 is radio control they control all the vechiles in an area and will despatch them based on the complaint

Flying squad is only despatched for Alpha complaints(In progress murder/ h/braeking robbery etc)

Station shift vechiles will respond to all complaints regardless

Complaints are classified as follows
Alpha - In progress priority complaints
Bravo - Occurred
Charlie - Attempted

Response time will depend on a number of factors, such as
- Vechiles available
- Number of complaints issued to each vechile
- Priority of compalints (A murder will be a higher priority than an House breaking occured
Time it takes for the vecchile to complete a complaint (Murder = 6+ hours / H/B = 3 hours / Drunk driver 5+ hours etc)

With regard to the response time, they need to break it down according to the priority of each complaint in order to give a clearer picture.

Wow thats cool thanks for sharing

[AnomalyNexus]

Not inclined to listen to any stats coming out of the police dept after the crime stat fiasco.

On a positive note, the police do seem to have stepped their game up a notch in the last month or two. Lots of headlines where of the criminals ended up in bodybags. And I doubt that we have the stats-wielding politicians to thank for that.

Oh, and what is the flying squad number. 082 something?

[Ekhaatvensters]

Oh, and what is the flying squad number. 082 something?

I've never seen a separate number being advertised, I think if you phone 10111 they dispatch the flying squad for in progress crime like R/SGT said.

The best might be to phone your local police station it seems. What about the cellphone numbers you see on the side of the vans?

[Kaufies]

FYI

10111 is radio control they control all the vechiles in an area and will despatch them based on the complaint

Flying squad is only despatched for Alpha complaints(In progress murder/ h/braeking robbery etc)

Station shift vechiles will respond to all complaints regardless

Complaints are classified as follows
Alpha - In progress priority complaints
Bravo - Occurred
Charlie - Attempted

Response time will depend on a number of factors, such as
- Vechiles available
- Number of complaints issued to each vechile
- Priority of compalints (A murder will be a higher priority than an House breaking occured
Time it takes for the vecchile to complete a complaint (Murder = 6+ hours / H/B = 3 hours / Drunk driver 5+ hours etc)

With regard to the response time, they need to break it down according to the priority of each complaint in order to give a clearer picture.

Makes sense. The other night there was a guy lurking in a garden. We called it in saying he had broken into our property and was walking around. The cops showed up in about 7/8 minutes. Still, the next day we sheepishly crawled back to our recently canceled alarm company

[Frankie]

And the end result is that the tax payers pay double.


Study: Security industry booms

The number of active private security officers increased 167% between 1997 and 2007, the South African Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR) said on Wednesday.

The number of police officials increased by only 18% over the same period, it said in a statement.

The number of private security officers went up from 115 331 in 1997 to 307 343 in 2007, the number of police from 110 177 to 129 864.

It appeared the private security sector was not just a supplement to the police force, but had become an essential part of the security framework, said SAIRR researcher Kerwin Lebone.

"This is problematic, as the police force is a service intended to protect the entire population, whereas private security will protect only those who can afford to pay for it," he said.

[Maddmatt]

Makes sense. The other night there was a guy lurking in a garden. We called it in saying he had broken into our property and was walking around. The cops showed up in about 7/8 minutes. Still, the next day we sheepishly crawled back to our recently canceled alarm company

The alarm company probably sent him after you cancelled
In SA I wouldn't be surprised.

SA is in serious need of more police officers. Here in New Zealand, I see them all the time. Just about everyday on my 10-minute drive to university I see a cop car. Wasn't the case in my 20-minute drive to university back in Durban, and back there I lived 5 minutes away from a police station.