- Years answering calls
- 30+
- Live agents, every call
- 24/7/365
- English & Spanish agents
- EN · ES
- Plans start at
- $33
Emergency answering service
An emergency call answering service that gets urgent calls to the right person
Some calls can’t wait for the morning: a gas smell, a flooded basement, a resident locked out in the cold, a patient with a worsening symptom, an employee hurt on a job site. Our emergency call answering service puts a live agent on those calls 24/7/365, gets the facts, and reaches your on-call person by the steps you set.
You decide what counts as an emergency and who handles it. We follow those rules on every call, in English and Spanish, and document every step so you know exactly what happened and when.
Urgent-call lines
Emergency answering service built on your rules
Every emergency line we run starts with your definitions, your contacts and your escalation tree.
Your emergency definitions
You tell us which calls are urgent. Agents ask your screening questions and act on the answers.
Live phone patch
The agent connects the caller straight to your on-call person and stays on until they’re connected.
Escalation trees
No answer from the first contact? The agent moves to the next, and the next, until someone has the call.
Current on-call schedule
Update your rotation in the client portal and agents use the new version on the next call.
Secure text alerts
On-call staff get the details by secure text, so they can act before they call back.
English and Spanish
Callers in a crisis are answered in their own language by live bilingual agents.
How emergency calls are handled
What happens when an urgent call comes in
The agent answers in your company’s name, confirms the facts, and starts your escalation steps right away.
- Urgent Your on-call person, reached now Live phone patch or secure text, working down your escalation tree until someone confirms
- Dispatch Crew or tech dispatched Job details sent to the on-call tech, vendor or crew by your rules
- Question Question answered Safety instructions you provide, read to the caller while help is on the way
Emergency response answering service
An emergency response answering service for dispatch and on-call teams
Restoration companies, plumbers, HVAC contractors, property managers and electricians run on emergency calls. An emergency response answering service keeps those calls moving: the agent captures the job, reaches your on-call tech, and logs who accepted it and when.
Healthcare practices, home care agencies and funeral homes use the same setup with different rules. Our after hours answering service covers the routine calls around them, so your on-call staff only hear about the ones that need them.
- Dispatch to on-call techs, vendors or crews
- Separate lines or rules for each location
- Acknowledgment tracked until someone accepts
- Calls documented step by step
- Contact lists and rotations updated through the client portal
Disaster recovery call center
A disaster recovery call center for when your office can’t answer
A storm knocks out power, the phone system goes down, a fire alarm empties the building, or the office has to close without warning. Your customers still call, and often that’s exactly when they need you most. With Southern Voices as your disaster recovery call center, you forward your lines to us and our agents pick up in your company’s name.
Southern Voices is a US company headquartered in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Our agents work from our office and remotely, and every call runs through our US-hosted systems, so trouble in one place doesn’t stop your phones from being answered. We wrote about staying open through storms in we’re here for you in any weather and after Hurricane Helene in Western North Carolina.
We help you plan the switch before you need it: how to forward your lines, what callers should hear about closures or delays, and which calls still go to your on-call contacts.
- A backup plan set up before you need it
- Your greeting and script ready to go
- Closure and delay updates for callers
- Urgent calls still sent to your on-call contacts
- Every message delivered by secure text, email or the client portal
Who it’s for
Emergency lines for every kind of on-call team
Property management
Leaks, lockouts and no-heat calls triaged and sent to your on-call tech.
Plumbing
Burst pipes and sewer backups dispatched any hour.
HVAC
No-heat and no-cooling emergencies routed by your rules.
Contractors
Job-site incidents and urgent client calls reach the right supervisor.
Medical practices
Urgent patient calls sent to the on-call provider by HIPAA-trained agents.
Funeral homes
First calls answered with care and passed to the director on call.
Pricing
What an emergency answering service costs
Plans start at $33, pricing follows your call volume and how much each call involves, and larger organizations get volume discounts: the more we handle for you, the lower your rate.
See answering service pricing for what goes into a quote, or ask us for one.
Plans start at
$33
Your plan is built around your call volume, and larger organizations get volume discounts.
Questions
Emergency answering service FAQs
Don’t see your question? Call and ask a live agent, any time.
What does an emergency call answering service do?
It puts a live agent on your urgent calls at any hour. The agent screens the call by your rules, reaches your on-call person by phone patch or secure text, follows your escalation tree if they don’t answer, and documents every step.
Who decides what counts as an emergency?
You do. We build your script around your own definitions, so true emergencies trigger your escalation steps and everything else is logged for the next business day.
Can you be our backup if our office loses power or phones?
Yes. Forward your lines to us and our agents answer in your name, following the backup plan we set up with you in advance.
Do you dispatch technicians?
Yes. Agents can send job details to your on-call tech, vendor or crew, and keep going down your list until someone accepts.
How is an emergency line different from after-hours answering?
After-hours answering covers every call while you’re closed. An emergency line is set up for the urgent ones, day or night, with rules that go straight to screening and dispatch. Many clients use both, and the same agents handle each.
How much does an emergency answering service cost?
Plans start at $33 and scale with call volume and complexity, with volume discounts for larger organizations. See our pricing page.
Keep reading
Emergency and after-hours guides
Winter after-hours emergency checklist
How property managers prepare for freeze-season calls.
Updating a rotating on-call schedule
Keep urgent calls going to the right person.
Are missed after-hours calls costing you?
What unanswered night and weekend calls really cost.
More answering services: after hours and 24/7 answering, overflow answering and all answering services.