Toronto Police Service (TPS) has launched a new *877 non-emergency number to divert calls from the main 911 emergency line.
Mobile devices can now dial *877 to report incidents that are no longer immediate emergencies, like home break-ins or thefts while you were away, dangerous driving, and concerning or hazardous behaviours with no immediate threat. These are some of the crimes that can be reported using the new non-emergency line. It should also be noted that callers must dial the asterisk symbol (*) before the number to properly access the line.
Traditional phones and landlines won’t be able to utilize the new *877 line, as the feature is only supported by major carriers like Bell, Rogers, Telus, and Freedom Mobile, along with their respective flanker brands.
According to Toronto police data, TPS is one of the busiest services in the country, receiving around two million calls every year. Despite this, it was found in a report from Toronto’s Auditor General that police services didn’t meet the National Emergency Number Association’s standards that require 90 per cent of emergency calls to be answered within 15 seconds, citing volume of calls and staffing levels as the main contributing factors to its performance. The new *877 non-emergency line was launched in response to recommendations made in the report.
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Source: Toronto Police Services via: CityNews Toronto
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