Record 9K calls flood Calgary's 311 line Wednesday
Only 40% of people braved the average 30-minute wait to talk to someone though, says city
Snow and slush helped push the City of Calgary's 311 information phone line to hit a record 9,000 phone calls Wednesday.
But the city’s transportation department’s Sean Somers says unfortunately 60 per cent of the callers hung up before they were dealt with.
“Just shy of 9,000 calls were actually offered into 311. I say ‘offered’ because we weren't actually able to answer all of them. At its peak we were getting about 800 calls an hour.”
The average wait was half an hour, said Somers.
The city is encouraging people to file their requests either online or through a mobile app if possible to avoid being kept on hold, said Somers.
“There are other ways of getting a hold of us and it will be treated the exact same way, ends up in the exact same data base and gets actioned in the exact same way as if you were to call.”
Somers said 30 per cent of the calls to 311 were about snow and ice issues.