The U.S. Congress has passed and the FCC has enacted Kari’s Law, which requires certain phone systems to support direct 911 dialing without an access code. UCOP has made the necessary changes to its Oakland-based phone system which serves the Franklin, Broadway, Kaiser and Sacramento buildings. We can now dial 911 from any UCOP phone with or without first dialing the access code 9.

Try to avoid accidental 911 calls

Unfortunately, direct 911 dialing increases our potential for calling 911 by accident. Please be extra vigilant to assure that misdials to 911 do not happen. Here are some instances to watch out for:

• When you dial a local or long-distance number, your call will begin with 9+1. If you inadvertently add a second digit one, you will call 911.
• To call an international number from an office phone, you will need to begin by entering 9 + 011. If you accidentally omit the digit zero, you will call 911

If you accidentally call 911, do not hang up

If you do inadvertently call 911, stay on the line and inform the operator that you have misdialed and do not need emergency assistance. If you do not take this step, emergency responders may be needlessly dispatched.

A note about Jabber

Please provide exact location information if you need to call 911 during an emergency. Jabber softphone technology may provide incorrect location data to 911, which may direct calls to the wrong emergency response center; the emergency response center may make errors when determining your location.

For questions about UCOP phone technology, please contact Randy Kemish.

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