What is E911?

Enhanced 911, E-911 or E911 is a North American telecommunications based system that automatically associates a physical address with the calling party's telephone number, and routes the call to the most appropriate Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP) for that address. The caller's address and information is displayed to the calltaker immediately upon call arrival. This provides emergency responders with the location of the emergency without the person calling for help having to provide it. This is often useful in times of fires, break-ins, kidnapping, and other events where communicating one's location is difficult or impossible.

The system only works in North America if the emergency telephone number 911 is called. Calls made to other telephone numbers, even though they may be listed as an emergency telephone number, may not permit this feature to function correctly. Outside the United States this type of facility is often called caller location, though its implementation is dependent on how the telephone network processes emergency calls.

When you sign up for a Press8 Hosted PBX System, you are automatically given this E911 feature. Here are some tips to be sure your E911 physical location shows up when you need it during an emergency:

• Each Press8 VoIP phone purchased through Press8 Telecom is pre-provisioned with it's own E911 physical address
• Just press 911 on your phone to contact emergency services
• Be sure that when your VoIP phone is moved to a new location, that you contact Press8 and give us the new physical address
• Having an up to date E911 physical address for each of your VoIP phones could save lives

Estimates based on Department of Labor statistics indicate that more than 60 million Americans working in or visiting office buildings, office campuses, hospitals and government buildings do not have the same 911 protection that they have at home.

This is very alarming.

Press8 Telecom has always been E911 compliant and that's not the case with all VoIP hosted PBX vendors. We feel it is our duty to keep our customers safe.

Sixteen states have now enacted E911 legislation requiring enterprises over a certain size, occupying multiple floors of a building or those purchasing a new PBX to implement E911 to protect their employees and visitors.

As a Press8 Telecom customer you will be in compliance as well as long as you keep us informed of any physical location change of your VoIP phones that you purchsed through us. It's an easy process. Just call us and we will update the E911 database record for your phone.

Help keep your business and your employees safe. Keep your E911 information for each of your Press8 hosted PBX VoIP phones current.

For more information, visit Press8's E911 Policy Page.