911, Vonage, and Unicel

There was an accident here today. I called 911 on my Vonage phone and was instantly connected to the right call center. That WAS important; I was worried as I dialed; I was wondering if I should have let the Verizon line my alarm uses surface somewhere so I could use it for the call.

The dispatcher was competent; trained first responders were on the scene almost immediately; the ambulance not long after that despite the fact that we’re in a rural area. Lots of credit due to South Hero Rescue.

While the ambulance was still in transit, Mary called 911 back for some advice. She used her Unicel cellphone because our cordless phone connected to Vonage didn’t work as far away as the victim was. She was connected to 911 across the Lake in New York State. Because Mary understands how the emergency call centers work and because these people were competent, too, she was fairly quickly patched back through to the people we’d been talking to here in South Hero – but it took a minute or two.

A few observations:

It’s a good thing that there was a fuss a while back about making sure that VoIP providers do provide real 911 service connecting to the correct responders.

It’s a good thing that Vonage decided to become a pain in the neck about insisting on a physical address associated with a number or I might not have done that. Also a good thing that I hadn’t moved the adaptor from somewhere else and forgotten to change the address – can happen.

If your primary phone is a VoIP phone, you should check with your provider to see what kind of 911 support you have and keep the addresses uptodate. It is possible that even Vonage isn’t connected everywhere as well as it is in South Hero but I don’t know that.

I don’t know if my street address popped up automatically at the call center because I blurted it out as soon as I was connected. This can be an important feature although it wasn’t in this case because I could stay on the line and give information.

If your primary phone is a cell phone – or you use a cell phone to call 911 for any reason – don’t expect to get full 911 services. The FCC has been much more patient with cellular carriers about getting location information right and connecting to the correct call center than it was with VoIP carriers despite the fact that cellphones are used much more frequently than VoIP phones to make 911 calls and GPS technology for cellphones is widely available.