Mass Alert Systems
- Jeff Dovyak , VE4MBQ,

Our ARES unit researched various mass notification (alert) system vendors for a system that would work for us.

After two no-cost trials, we have gone with One Call Now (www.onecallnow.com), and their basic pay-as-you-go package for $90 for 1000 "credits" - each notification call or SMS text counts as 1 credit, so our 70 member ARES group with a total of 122 contact numbers would be 122 credits per notification, giving us eight phone and SMS notifications.

For my first test, I sent Winnipeg ARES Emergency Coordinators, AECs, PIO and two special tech savvy members (eight in total) an alert exercise message with request to meet me on the air on a local repeater.
- It didn't work well. I only heard from one of the eight:
The recipients were leery about answering calls from 1-877 numbers.
I now have the system set up to display the "local" number for my ARES pager.

For a wider audience test of Winnipeg ARES members who knew I was looking at a mass notification system vendor and that I was targeting a specific day for a test (a provincial holiday in Manitoba), I used the messenger to distribute a draft exercise plan. As a result, for the actual test notification/on-air exercise net, I heard from half of the Winnipeg ARES membership (many were away for the long weekend).

A group leader gets a report from the provider for each notification, and can log in and see a detailed report of which recipients answered and when they did so.

I have made my AECs and PIO "messengers" so they each have a discrete log-in and can transmit a notification.

This system sure beats our cumbersome, sub-optimal, time-consuming telephone tree fan-out protocol.

-- Jeff Dovyak , VE4MBQ,
Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada ARES

Source:
www.arrl.org/ares-el?issue=2016-03-16