Is calling your Local Police dept. or 911 faster in response time?

Question

In case of an emergency do you think I should set my local police department on speed dial or use 911 when time depends on it. This I think is a helpful question because it's well useful in dangerous situations.

Answer 1

Always call 911. 911 is the nationally designated emergency number. Most police stations are substations, and do not have dispatchers in them. Even in large cities, you will be transferred to a dispatch center.

For instance, my police department handles general business, but does not have a desk officer. If you want to talk to a deputy, you have to pick up a phone in the lobby (or outside if at night), and it will connect you straight to a dispatcher. Our dispatch center is in the county seat, twenty miles away. They then send out the appropriate unit to help you.

Our dispatch center handles transfers (from people who call the police stations), the non-emergency number to request police service, and 911. Our dispatchers can actually tell where a call is originating. The 911 lines will get picked up first. At the police station, you'll have to get through a recorded message ("If this is an emergency, hang up and call 911. Press 1 now if you are injured, a crime is in progress, or if your life is in danger. For records, press 2. For traffic, press 3; etc."), wait in the phone queue, explain to the operator (or front-desk lady) what your emergency, and wait while she transfers you to dispatch's non-emergency line.

The point is 911 is an emergency number, and will always connect you to someone who can summon all the help you will need. It might be the state police, the local police, your sheriff's department, or the fire department, but they can help you much better and faster than the operator at the police station. Don't take the time to look up the local station's number in the phonebook when you can hit the one phone number everyone knows.

Answer 2

Our local police department closes down at night and the sheriff's department takes over. 911 is faster, but it should only be used for genuine emergencies. If you want to report an unsafe traffic condition or other non life threatening situation, you would be better off talking to the dispatcher. Put 911 on the speed dial and the dispatcher in your regular address and phone number directory. By the way, many cell phones use a modified form of 911, so make sure you are calling an emergency service that can actually help you. If the 911 your mobile provides is not the local one, you may be better off calling the dispatcher anyway!

Answer 3

Wow, I can't believe some of these answers..... First of all, cell phones DO NOT have any kind of "modified 911". 911 is 911 from a landline or cell phone. Same thing, different ways of getting there.

Secondly, if you wife or child is missing you dial 911, not the local pd.

Many dispatch centers do not work the same way. They all have many different set ups, policies, and ways of doing things. So you may get transferred, or you may not.

The person that answers your 911 call is often the same person that will be dispatching the police or fire department.

If you dial your local pd's 7 digit number your probably getting someone they has no access to a radio, and is probably only a secretary or records clerk that will transfer you to the Dispatch center... Dispatch IS 911. So just call 911.

Answer 4

1

Answer 5

2

Answer 6

In an emergency, dial 911. This line is answered immediately. Any other line into your local police is last priority compared to 911.

Answer 7

Call Local Police Station

Answer 8

Depends on where you are. I called 911 today because of a fire not far from me. I got police dispatch, told them there was a fire, told them the street, told them the cross street....and she kept asking, annoyed, "Ma'am? What's your emergency?" If I had been in trouble, I'd have been dead by the time she got it! Then, once she heard the word "fire" the second time, she transfered me and told me not to hang up! Why can't SHE tell the fire department? Once I got on the phone with the fire department, she got it right away! Maybe I should call the fire department directly when I have an emergency!

Answer 9

911

Answer 10

Always call 911 in an emergency. Calls are not dispatched from the station, unless it's in a small town.