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MACC' .or 'The Eusters Club'..or 'When I Were a Lad

Posted by John Stead on May 31, 2009 at 9:45 AM

I'm thinking of starting a club called The Eusters Club, as in 'I Euster be fireman' or 'It Euster be different in my day'. Read on and see why.....and I'll get to the 'Fire Brigade' point in a minute.....

I recently had to dial 999 for an ambulance. Although I was connected almost immediately to the BT operator, I was told that there was a 4 minute delay in West Yorkshire Ambulance answering the call, and so it was. (If you think that is shocking, bear in mind that the last time I called them, about two years ago, there was a 20 MINUTE delay !!!!!)

However, once I got through, my problems were not over.

I gave the address and the reason for calling, (the fact that my mother in law appeared to be on the point of extinction, with shallow breathing, little pulse, etc, etc.)

The operator at the other end, however, ignored my concise request and description and continued to follow what I can only suspect was a script, repeatedly asking questions that I had already answered. It seemed as if common sense had been programmed out of her!

My point is this.....the man in charge of the new MACC at Wakefield proudly states that 'he has over 10 years experience in the call centre industry'. Well bully for him! We all know what it's like to call a call centre! It used to be the case (there's that word again, 'Euster') that to work in Brigade Control required a modicum of common sense, and so it still is. However, within the next few years, more and more people are going to be recruited for these jobs on the basis of their call centre skills, and I can see that the excellent quality of operators that we have at the moment will slowly but surely be diluted.

The same 'Script Mentality' exists in the Police, too, as I know again from experience.

I wonder if these Call Centre Specialists think that all members of the public exist in a sort of 'London's Burning' world, living in Coronation Street next door to Emmerdale Farm, where everyone panics and runs around like headless chickens?

Eeee....when I were a lad It Euster be different, we took our own calls, and t'public were lucky if we answered 'em because of all t'cleaning and dusting we had to do, and all't memorising of General Order 1/1960 (that'll rattle a few cages...) , but you try telling 'em that today, and they won't believe you!

Luxury!

By the way, mum in law is in hospital still (6 weeks later). The Paramedic was here in two minutes, and saved her life as far as I am concerned, but the ambulance was a further 25. What a state of affairs we are getting to.....

Categories: Your Views

3 Comments

Reply Mark Elliott

06:54 PM on June 01, 2009

Hi John,
I can agree completely with what you have said.

We ALL 'Euster' do all sorts in this country!!, But now we are LIMITED to what we can do - obviously, Because this country is run by 'Little Sh*itpots' who manage to get into management somehow!!

I'm not surprised at YMAS, They have no way near the best ROD - Record of attendance in the country's Ambulance services.

That's maybe why they don't have a site showing their call outs like WY Fire do?

I think they try and let the Paramedics do all the running around in their flash cars.

I know in some areas there is only 1 Ambulance per x amount of miles, I was talking to an Ambulance driver a few years back and he said that there was only 1 Ambulance at certain times for the Dewsbury area!!

The country's getting 'Worse' by the week, And everyone wants this 'So called' Government to go!!

Tony Blair & Gordon Brown = Tom & Jerry - Only Jerry is left to run the country!!

I could quite easily go to Spain and live over there, But it is obviously easier said than done!!

The hospitals are A1 over there as well as the quality of life etc.

You just have to make the most of what you have got and 'Plough' on regardless of how depressing Great Britain is becoming (Rise above it all)!!

Some disagree with the state of Britain, But they have plenty of money, Good jobs & probably never been hungry!!

People are losing their jobs 'Everyday' nobody is 'Immune' to failure, As much as they think they are not.

In your mother in laws case, It was 'Diabolical' to wait all that time!!

John, I would just ask for a Paramedic if you ever have to call them again, Or drive to the hospital yourself if you are able to!!

They must have known that there wasn't an Ambulance in your area to respond quickly?

This is all 'Part & parcel' why this country is falling down, Because nobody does anything RIGHT anymore and if they do they just do the BARE minimum as I know too well.

Compared to people in other countries.

I hope your Mother in law fully recovers.

I know who I will be voting for on the 4th June!!

Regards.
Mark Elliot.

Reply exwfb

12:23 PM on June 02, 2009

I worked in a fire control for 13 years before moving to Yorkshire, five years of that as what is now known as a Watch Manager and I can vouch for the fact that the level of service given by F&R services nationwide is second to none. For the last 6 years I have worked in a police control room. I feel I must defend the honour of our other blue light colleagues!

Part of the reason the F&R service can offer such a fantastic service is the level of resources they have available to them. Only once in 13 years did I come anywhere near running out of resources. However for the police and ambulance service demand far out weighs resources.

Calls to the fire service will 99 times out of a 100 require an immediate response and the public, in my experience, only call on the fire service in an emergency situation on the whole. Police and ambulance get calls to all sorts of things - some of which are not even in that services remit to deal with and certainly not an emergency. Of the 999 calls received by the police probably only about 25% require an emergency response.

I accept that ambulance control is scripted, I do have some knowledge of their workings, this is for very good reasons, it allows the assessment of the patient in order to give an appropriate response. What is often seen as time wasting is in fact gathering vital information for those responding to the incident. It also allows for the ambulance controller to assess the call for the appopriate level of response, all too sadly the stories of people dialling 999 for a stubbed toe or toothache are all too common and a daily occurrence. Ambulance controllers are often able to give life saving advice over the telephone after asking the aforementioned questions.

With regards to police control I can assure you that we are far from scripted, we do not read from scripts, however there are certain questions that we need to ask to ascertain the problem and the level of police response. Not all calls to the police (or ambulance) are treated as emergencies. However, from a police perspective if a call is an emergency the police call handler remaining on the line does not slow anything up, a computerised log goes to colleagues to dispatch the appropraite police resources whilst vital information such as descriptions of suspects, vehcile details and directions of travel are gained. This is far from wasting time but in fact assisting officers responding.

I can understand the frustration if having to wait for calls to be answered, however people do not use the 999 system responsibly, and will use if as a means of contacting the emergency services for whatever reason.

Police and ambulace receive considerably more calls than the fire service, in the force I work in we receive somewhere in the region of 3500 calls in any 24 hour period. And of course there are not spread out evenly throughout the day with evenings and and weekend nights attracting large numbers of 999 calls.

I feel it is easy to perceive that other control rooms do not offer the level of service the the F&R service does, but rather than blaming the service I feel that we should be looking at our society today and the demands that they make on the blue light services.

Not wanting to make light of the situation but the government have their 'drink responsibly campaign' perhaps they should conside a 'use 999 and the emergency services responsibly'.

As I stated at the beginning, I worked for the fire service for almost 13 years and they were some of the best years of my life. I too share concerns about regionalisation of the fire service, but I feel due to the nature of the F&R services work and by far the majority of calls being emergencies it will be anything but a call centre.

Finally, I do hope your mother in law is making a good recovery.

Reply Mark Elliott

09:23 PM on August 24, 2009

Thinking about 'Eusters' I was talking to an Ex Sub the other day, And he commented and we were laughing on the Brigade not having any 'Characters' anymore!!

Back in the 70's & 80's West Riding & WY had it's share of 'Characters' who you would not even think would be capable of being an operational firefighter, The 'General Public' would be 'Amazed' if they knew what went on at a Fire Station!!Lol

It was normal customery to have a hose put down your 'Y Fronts' now & again.

And Firemen sat drinking at the bar!!

Obviously I won't mention any names, As I know and remember some of them.

And maybe so will some of you.Lol!!

I could write a book!!