Communications Officer (999 & 101)

"He just went crazy. He slammed the door and started screaming in my face, he went to the kitchen. He's got a knife. He threw everything on the floor. I've run upstairs - I'm hiding in the bedroom - I dragged a cabinet in front of the door. But it won't take him long to get through. Can you hear him?! Can you hear him?!"

This job is all in the detail. Did she say he slammed the door in her face or just slammed the door? He has a knife or had a knife? As you are listening, you are typing. As you are typing you are beginning to categorise the call-in order of priority. As you are analysing the information given to you, you are thinking of the next questions to ask. You are doing all of this whilst attempting to calm the caller down and reassure them that you will get help to them as soon as possible. You pass everything on to a colleague who will despatch the appropriate resources to assist. The situation is still happening, but your involvement is over.

And you move onto the next call.

We are always looking for great people to join our team

You will be customer-focussed and professional, have great attention to detail and a calm head under pressure. Above all, you'll have the drive and determination to make a difference to the communities of London. With the volume of requests handled through our teams each day, the importance of these roles can never be underestimated.

This can be a challenging and sometimes intense job. Our teams are the first point of contact for some 13,000 emergency and non-emergency phone calls and 12,000 interactions via our digital platforms every day. Naturally this means we have a fast-paced and dynamic environment where no two days are the same.

We ask our teams to assess priority and severity of incidents, whilst always doing their best to reassure the caller that we'll get them the appropriate support or assistance as quickly as possible.

Our Despatchers will work across the entire organisation, covering one of our 12 Borough Command Units and also the wider London area; as a Despatcher you will be communicating with officers on the ground and deploying units to calls received within our Command & Control centres.

Key Responsibilities

What does the average day look like? Your duties will include:

Handling emergency and non-emergency calls. We work with a framework, and you will triage calls in accordance with this, assessing each one's priority and risks.

Prioritising a response to incidents

Working with colleagues across the boroughs of London to manage our response to requests for assistance.

Facilitating telephone interpreting for callers who speak little or no English, building confidence across our multi-cultural communities and for those visiting the capital.

Work within the Despatch and Pan London environments speaking to officers and staff on the radios and deploying units to calls.

Carry out Police National Computer or other intelligence enquiries on behalf of officers eg. vehicle and name checks

You will provide the customer-focused, professional, first point of contact our callers expect. You do not need previous experience; instead, we're looking for common sense, attention to detail, good communication skills and a calm head under pressure.

Shift Patterns, MetCC Communications Officer 2024 - Content (3).pdf - 400KB Opens in a new window

Disability Confident Statement

The Met is committed to being an equitable (fair and impartial) and inclusive employer for disabled people, striving to have a diverse and representative workforce at all levels. We encourage applications from people from the widest possible range of backgrounds, cultures and experiences. We particularly welcome applications from people with disabilities and long-term conditions, ethnic minority groups and women.

As a Disability Confident employer, the Met has committed to making disability equality part of our everyday practice. We ensure that people with disabilities and those with long term conditions have the opportunities to fulfil their potential and realise their aspirations.

The Met is committed to making reasonable adjustments to the recruitment process to ensure disabled applicants can perform at their best. If you need any reasonable adjustments or changes to the application and recruitment process, we ask that you include this information within your application form. All matters will be treated in strict confidence.

Please note, if you are applying for a police officer role or to become a police community support officer (PCSO) or designated detention officer (DDO), there is a minimum requirement that you must pass a job-related fitness test (JRFT) at point of entry. This does not apply to police staff roles. Find out more about police fitness standards.

Salary: Circa £42,497. Your salary package will comprise of a starting base salary of £30,507, 20% shift allowance, 10% flexibility allowance, a location allowance of £1,841 and a non-pensionable allowance of £1,000. (Please note: During training, shift allowance will be 15%), All new staff will be required to work full time for the duration of their training and coaching; which is currently 16 weeks. After that time you will aligned to one of our core teams and may then submit a flexible working application for consideration as part of the annual flexible working application process.

You will be required to work a 24/7, 365 day a year variable shift pattern, including nights and public holidays. We actively support flexible working, questions regarding this can be addressed during the recruitment process.

The normal working hours are 36hrs per week, full time excluding breaks. Working a shift pattern does attract payment of a Shift Disturbance Allowance and Flexibility Allowance. We'll talk to you about this more throughout the recruitment process.