The average time taken for Durham Constabulary to answer 101 calls has fallen by more than 80 per cent over the last ten months after significant investment in the Force Control Room.
Since March last year, the force has recruited an extra 29 call handlers and six switchboard staff to work in the Force Control Room, alongside a new switchboard triage system.
Nine further call handlers are currently going through training and will join the Force Control Room later this month.
It means that non-emergency calls made to the force are now answered, on average, within 51 seconds.
This marks a reduction of 81 per cent compared with March last year, when the average time to answer a 101 call was four-and-a-half minutes.
Calls made to 999 have also showed a significant improvement.
Chief Inspector Laura Backhouse, from the Force Control Room, said: “Public confidence starts with people being able to contact us quickly when they need us, not just for 999 emergencies but for those non-urgent 101 calls too. We knew we needed to improve the service we provided so, over the last year, we have implemented additional resources and revised a number of processes.
“This has resulted in significant improvements in this area – we used to measure our average call handling times on 101 in minutes, now we measure it in seconds.
“We are also in the process of moving towards the Single Online Home website, which will allow members of the public to submit some queries and applications online, freeing up more Control Room staff to deal with 101 and 999 calls. We know we have further to go, and more improvement needs to be made because every call matters, but we’re confident we are heading in the right direction.”