e911

[Jeff K]

Nexmo states that it does not support e911, so is there a workaround for this so that when we call 911 it will show them the correct address?

I was also looking at flowroute, but they charge $1.39 per number for e911. Would I just need to add e911 for our main line and then route all outgoing calls through that number?

Sorry I am new to 3CX and just evaluating my options.

 

[leejor]

Any solution will require two things, a number that has an address registered against it when 911 is called, and that number (not a DID) is the one sent when 911 is dialled.

How the second requirement is met, may be different for each installation, depending on your trunking, and how you handle outbound caller ID.

As a last resort, a new, separate trunk group, may be required, that will only show a "main" billing number.

 

[nub]

outbound rules:
rule name:911
calls to numbers starting with prefix, 911.
calls to numbers with a length of 3.

then use the route you want, and test test test. make sure the address and number shows and you are calling your local 911 service, so less chance of rogue 911 fee.

 

[cobaltit]

You only need e911 for each LOCATION you have. So if you have 1 number or a 1000 numbers at one building you need 1 e911 setup. That is predicated on you pushing that one number (typically a main number) out when dialing 911. Outside of that 3CX is pretty bad in handling, hence the number of ideas requests going back years on how to improve.

- If you have 20 phones and everyone calls out pushing their own DID normally you either need to get e911 setup for each number or do one of the many hacks (such as a separate trunk for e911 as mentioned above).

- If you have an install for a school or hotel or large campus where you want the outgoing number to always be shown but when 911 is dialed you want to give more specific information such as BLDG/FL/ROOM you have do a similar hack which would be a 911 trunk and outbound rule per extension or group of extensions at a particular location which also sucks.

Ideally 3CX would give you a seperate field at a per extension level to set the 911 CID. FreePBX has done this for years. That would solve many situations inside of 3CX. For some of the above scenarios you'd probably look at a 3rd party integration where you can pass the location information to outside of 3CX.

 

[Thiek]

We continue to struggle with this issue and Jeff K. you need to look at the e911 legislation for the state your PBX is located.

I've installed in some states where they only need to know the building location unless there are multiple buildings and/or floors. About to install in a state where any PBX installed after 2004 must report down to the "station" level yet "station" is not defined. We then discovered the phone carrier will allow us to report up to 10 different numbers to the PSAP (911 center) for free, so we'll reserve 10 DIDs, divvy the building into zones and assign a DID to each zone. Then tweak the address (via phone carrier) associated with each DID to relate to a zone. This will then require some tweaking within 3cx with Outbound rules, creating groups, etc. I can go into more detail if you desire. My issue, I can't believe 3CX seems to ignore this requirement.

The other option, if you have to report down to the station level, you can setup a PSAli or ALI database with companies like West, or the phone provider might offer this for a price. But I believe you may need to have a DID for each phone for this to work. You then register each DID in their PSAli, enter specific location with each DID (building 2, 3rd floor, north east quad). Now when 911 is called this info. will get reported to the local PSAP... and they will also send out a notification (email / text) to key people that 911 was dialed. A PSAli will usually support different locations, even in different states, and report 911 to the appropriate local PSAP (911 center). Becomes cost effective when you have multiple sites, and with different legislation in each.

As for people using the 3cx softclient on a tablet, or smartphone, a whole new can of worms.