FCC Requirments for Paging

[mikeinet 37]

I'm trying to redo some dispatch protcols for my ambulance corp - we're a self dispatching agency.

Syracuse City Ambulance (Rural/Metro) does not page ambulances when they have calls - its more of a "control 132 priority 2 south state street" ... "132 at erie and midler" "132... priroity 2... 30M....etc."

We've been thinking about taking this type of approach rather than paging the vehicles (simply a radio tone - we have crews on so don't really NEED for a tone to go off to say set off a pager). Currently, we'll send the tone, then say "a1 priority 1... university ave" then say "a1 in the driveway go ahead with the call" "a1 you'll be responding priority 1... 500 university ave... xxxxxx etc." - so we drop the tone and it just wastes about 20sec for no real reason.

Someone told me though that its actually a FCC regulation to page a vehicle/agency for an emergency call? Is there any truth to this? anyone have any background on this?

Thanks,

Mike

[tbendick 27]

Can't see it being an FCC thing, however NFPA might have something on it. FDNY EMS Dispatching works pretty much the same way. Most units have computers but everything is still started in voice no tones or anything. Dispatcher calls unit "02B for the assignment" unit will respond either "02B send it" if computer equipped or "02B read it" if not computer equipped. Dispatcher will then say "02B 34street and 10th Ave for the Trauma" if the unit has a computer and the rest goes to the MDT. For units with no computer they will read the entire job over the radio. You only will hear the tones if nobody answers the radio.

On a side note. If you have any trouble with units that miss calls because they didn't hear the radio. You should look into some type of tone system, doesn't have to be like the FD's 2 tone style. I would say you might want to look into something like MDC from Motorola. This way when you call a unit if they don't answer you can page the radios and if set right the radio will go to full volume. Helps if the crew had turn down the radio volume. Also the MDC doesn't take seconds like the 2 tones on the FD.

[Skooter92 7]

The FCC has no rules for how you transmit a call to a unit, other than if the frequency assigned has a particular mode assigned per the license you must use that assigned mode (i.e., use voice vs. data depending on the mode assignment-check your license!) Tones vs. voice vs. MDC vs. bongo drums vs. nothing at all-totally up to you. Technically, your license should also state if any pagers are allowed vs. mobile units on the assigned freqs-again, read your license. Other than that, follow FCC guidelines on appropriate content and station identification and you can do whatever works best for your agency.

[mikeinet 37]

http://wireless2.fcc.gov/UlsApp/UlsSearch/...?licKey=1674700

these are the two licences I see for us... both mobile.

Edited October 18, 2005 by mikeinet