I'm looking for some information

[Cameron1988]

Hello everyone!

I'll introduce myself first, my name is Cam and I work with a company who provides a nationwide service for connecting the public to services such as the police and paramedics. I'd like to apologise ahead of time if any of my terminology is incorrect, and would love for any corrections

I'm currently working on a project to hopefully try to improve the quality of service for our callers who are either deaf or hard of hearing. We have the text relay service available for those who have access to a text phone, however we also speak to people who are hard of hearing on a daily basis.

Until lately, I did not realise that when my team started this role that there is no process in place on how to communicate effectively with callers who experience trouble communicating via voice calls.
I am hoping to implement a process for the operators to use for providing effective service to these callers as soon as possible, in fact I am presenting some of my data to my manager next week!

So far, I have detailed information on the following areas;

• Different types of hearing loss, and how those affect what is heard by the caller.
• How hearing loss can occur (through age, accidents, injuries etc)
• How to rephrase and reiterate any questions that we ask with the hope that the caller is able to pick up on different verbal cues
• Using full sentences and not abbreviating words
• The effect that background noise can have when speaking to someone who is hard of hearing.

I've also detailed about how enunciating is important, and that when speaking face to face, or videocalling then lip reading can be relied upon (sadly this isn't as helpful when on the other end of a phone line!


Now, with this in mind I would love to learn some more about the issues that are faced when using a voice call system, and hopefully some ways that I can really try to make a difference for the HoH community! I learned a lot about communicating with the HoH with my grandfather as his hearing deteriorated rapidly in his later years (he used to work on the railway!) and I've also spoken to a neighbour of mine who worked in a school for the deaf up until her retirement a few years ago.



Thank you so much for your time, and any information that you can provide!



Cameron

 

[DeafDucky]

Good info- can't think of anything at the moment but wanted to post this before I forgot...

Don't forget to include information about Video Relay Services for those who use ASL and will call the voice number through VRS (Same idea as the text relay).

 

[Jane B.]

You speak of text relay the US state relay services (reached by dialing 711) also offer what is called VCO (voice carryover) where the caller will be speaking for themselves but will need time to read the replies from your operators that the Relay CA's are typing to them.

Also, I think you may get calls from people that are using a captioning service on their cell phone. That results in the same situation where the caller is talking for themself but needs time to read the captions of what your operators are saying to them.

Both of these situations could result in your operators hanging up while the person that has made the call is reading what has been said to them.