Emergency Notification ??

[frazierr]

We have a Meridian Opt 11c with HMS-400 (hospitality version of CallPilot) and I have a request to set up something for emergency notification.

Can "all" phones of a class be rung at once so we can read/send a message or (better in my opinion) voicemail be set up to send voicemail to all phones in a class...?

We would like to be able to notify all of our in-house guests in case of emergency. (We are essentially a resort with about a hundred rooms, analog phones in each with voicemail provided by the HMS-400.) Lately, we have some potential issues in the area that may require notification and/or evacuation of our guests, asd we are looking for ways to notify everyone of the status.

After searching, I didn't find anything that seemed to fit..

All input gratefully accepted!
Thanks
--Rick

 

[acewarlock]

I don't think you can ring all phones at one time as you would blow out the Ring Gen.

You could use Vmail broadcast to send a message to all Vmail, but with 100 rooms you would need alot of Vmail Port so everone could check there Vmail. One Port for each person to check there Vmail at the same time. The President of the last company I worked for Sent a 20min message to every Vmail on the system and it took about 4 hrs for everyone to get the message and it was blocking new calls trying to leave a message. I only had 230 Vmila on the system with 200hrs recording time and it almost used it all.




This is a Signature and not part of the answer, it appears on every reply.

This is an Analogy so don't take it personally as some have.

Why change the engine if all you need is to change the spark plugs.

 

[grumpyone60]

Ace, did we work for the same company?? My former CEO did the same thing.... His name was Alex S.

 

[johnpoole]

a broadcast mb would be the best bet.. keep the msg short.. a group call could reach your admin ext's.. but the guest phones... you could program a wake up msg and try setting all occupied rooms to notify... the hosp side allows that, but your not going to get out a bomb threat in time...

your looking at a couple of hours for 200 stations... if i was really concerned about instant response, i'd look into a external page system..

john poole
bellsouth business
columbia,sc

 

[acewarlock]

No grumpyone60, his name was Rick S




This is a Signature and not part of the answer, it appears on every reply.

This is an Analogy so don't take it personally as some have.

Why change the engine if all you need is to change the spark plugs.

 

[frazierr]

Thanks to all, I thought this would be "interesting"...
Yep, thought of the ring generator problem (Saw what could happen on an uncontrolled switch when someone did that 15 years ago), and of course the number of available ports we have for voicemail is only 10 (9 useable because housekeeping update takes one of the ports). Last night as I drifted off to sleep I realized there was just no way even a short message could be retrieved in any reasonable time. Funny how the brain doesn't kick in until after one sends a help message...

This group is wonderful for the variety and extensive background of the participants, I probably would have never thought of the wake up call approach.

I'm very interested in the possibility of a special wakeup call... It seems it would be the least problem for our system, and could actually work in a reasonable amount of time.

The situation is that we are located in Hawaii National Park, about 1.5 miles from the Halema'uma'u crater, which is spewing elevated amounts of sulfur dioxide. If the wind direction were to change, we may need to notify our guests.
We do have an in-house TV channel that we can broadcast a Powerpoint presentation and/or detailed verbal instructions, so being able to create a wakeup message that says: "We are at Condition Orange (or Red, whatever), please turn on your television to Channel 2 for more information" sounds like a functional method.

So, given all that, what is the process of preparing a message sending it to the rooms?

- Could I have the alternate message(s) prepped and waiting before the event? (or do I need to replace the existing message)

- Can I send to blocks of rooms somehow? (or am I forced to set wakeup one at a time...)

As you know if you've seen my previous posts, I'm not a trained Mer Tech, and have taken over our system because we just couldn't get a decent local support contract on our island. I'm a senior IT Specialist/Mgr and do have experience with DCO and some other phone systems, so it's not totally alien to me and I come up to speed fast. I really like the programmability of the Meridian system, particluarly compared to some of the old systems I used to work on.

Thanks
-_Rick

 

[johnpoole]

you can prep the msg ahead of schedule... i've only set up hosp on the nortel a few times so i can't help with a broadcast wake up call.. sounds like a hard place to work, if you needed an inhouse tech i might fly over (joke)...

john poole
bellsouth business
columbia,sc

 

[acewarlock]

frazierr: I could come there to work and my wife is a Nurse.




This is a Signature and not part of the answer, it appears on every reply.

This is an Analogy so don't take it personally as some have.

Why change the engine if all you need is to change the spark plugs.

 

[frazierr]

Thanks all.

We seem to get a lot of offers to do "site surveys" here...
Even located at elevation of 4000 feet, on the rainy side of the island, there are still a lot of offers...

As always, I really appreciate all of the responses, as they definitely help keep me on the right track (and sane).

--Rick