Job summary
Job Title: Communications Switchboard Operator (Relief Post - covering range of shifts as/when required)
Salary/Band: 3
Speciality: Estates & Facilities
Care Organisation: Oldham
Contract type and hours: 37.5
Main duties of the job
As a switchboard operator you will be an essential link in the telephone communication system. The operator is the first point of contact with the public, internal and external medical staff and many other crucial hospital calls. The calls are often critical and the response not straight forward, training and experience are essential when linking callers to their required destination.
About us
The Northern Care Alliance NHS Foundation Trust (NCA) provides hospital and integrated health and social care services to over one million people living across Greater Manchester. Our 20,000 colleagues care for people in hospital and in the community, working across Bury, Rochdale, Oldham and Salford, to save and improve lives.
As a large NHS trust we are committed to enhancing the health of our local population by delivering consistently high standards of care and working closely with local authorities and key partners. We believe in our power and potential to make a difference and we're always looking for people who demonstrate our three core values - care, appreciate and inspire - to join our team.
In return, we can offer you a job role with purpose and flexibility. The size and scale of the NCA means we can provide more challenge and opportunities so your career can always be moving in the right direction. By joining us you can also access a competitive benefits package, including, a fantastic annual leave allowance, flexible working opportunities and protected hours for health and wellbeing activities, helping you to achieve more personal downtime and a better work-life balance.
For the latest information around our values and behaviours, please visit our careers website: https://careers.northerncarealliance.nhs.uk/working-with-us/our-values/
Job description
Job responsibilities
Professional Duties
- You will answer all incoming calls promptly, within a set maximum target time and connect the caller with the correct recipient or department required.
- You will fully understand and be able to utilise all extensions and switchboard features in the efficient handling of calls and callers.
- As a switchboard operator you will contact via the bleep system members of staff who possess receivers and radio pagers.
- You will ensure that the appropriate members of staff and authorities are contacted in the case of fire, security & critical alarms, major incidents, and inclusive of remote site support.
- Take appropriate action to alert emergency teams and personnel for cardiac arrest and medical emergencies such as Head/Full/ED Only Traumas, Red CVA/Stroke.
- To operate VDU consoles, incorporating and extensive internal and external directory in order to manage calls.
- To operate other computer programmes, bleep consoles [LCUs] and be able to generate basic reports from bleep management systems out of hours.
- Monitor and maintain emergency mobile phones are kept at optimum power levels.
- To ensure that on-call departmental rota changes are updated and implemented and to provide varied support to on-call personnel, ensuring that the appropriate members of staff are called for out of hours duties.
- To operate patients records software when locating patients out of hours.
- To liaise with General Practitioners, in relation to patient admissions.
- To arrange and maintain records for audit purposes for all taxi journeys for patients, samples, and on-call staff, etc.
- To attend Trust mandatory and any other specific training courses as identified and deemed appropriate for the services.
- To undertake as required any other duties as requested by the Telecommunications Manager.
- Facilitate improved communication between departments and service users.
- To highlight potential problems which may impinge on the effective and
- efficient running of the service. i.e., systems fault reporting to I.T Helpdesk.
- Responsible for communicating professionally and effectively to service users.
Communications and Relationships
- Successful Candidate(s) must be able to communicate well both verbally and show ability to use various communications systems within the Switchboard Department
- The switchboard operator is the integral link for the initial communication to staff (normally off site) for the Trust Major Incident Procedures. Essentially the switchboard operator works on their own (without supervision) 75% of the week. The onus is therefore on them to respond swiftly to all situations, often emergency (i.e. major incidents, crash calls or contact a specific medical specialist).
- Other aspects of communication involve, operation of the radio paging equipment, fire/bomb threat calls, arranging emergency journeys out of hours.
To read more information about the advertised role, and the main job duties/responsibilities please open the Job Description and Person Specification located under the supporting documents heading. You can also read more information about working at the Northern Care Alliance within the attached Candidate Information Pack or by visiting our careers website: careers.northerncarealliance.nhs.uk
Job description
Job responsibilities
Professional Duties
- You will answer all incoming calls promptly, within a set maximum target time and connect the caller with the correct recipient or department required.
- You will fully understand and be able to utilise all extensions and switchboard features in the efficient handling of calls and callers.
- As a switchboard operator you will contact via the bleep system members of staff who possess receivers and radio pagers.
- You will ensure that the appropriate members of staff and authorities are contacted in the case of fire, security & critical alarms, major incidents, and inclusive of remote site support.
- Take appropriate action to alert emergency teams and personnel for cardiac arrest and medical emergencies such as Head/Full/ED Only Traumas, Red CVA/Stroke.
- To operate VDU consoles, incorporating and extensive internal and external directory in order to manage calls.
- To operate other computer programmes, bleep consoles [LCUs] and be able to generate basic reports from bleep management systems out of hours.
- Monitor and maintain emergency mobile phones are kept at optimum power levels.
- To ensure that on-call departmental rota changes are updated and implemented and to provide varied support to on-call personnel, ensuring that the appropriate members of staff are called for out of hours duties.
- To operate patients records software when locating patients out of hours.
- To liaise with General Practitioners, in relation to patient admissions.
- To arrange and maintain records for audit purposes for all taxi journeys for patients, samples, and on-call staff, etc.
- To attend Trust mandatory and any other specific training courses as identified and deemed appropriate for the services.
- To undertake as required any other duties as requested by the Telecommunications Manager.
- Facilitate improved communication between departments and service users.
- To highlight potential problems which may impinge on the effective and
- efficient running of the service. i.e., systems fault reporting to I.T Helpdesk.
- Responsible for communicating professionally and effectively to service users.
Communications and Relationships
- Successful Candidate(s) must be able to communicate well both verbally and show ability to use various communications systems within the Switchboard Department
- The switchboard operator is the integral link for the initial communication to staff (normally off site) for the Trust Major Incident Procedures. Essentially the switchboard operator works on their own (without supervision) 75% of the week. The onus is therefore on them to respond swiftly to all situations, often emergency (i.e. major incidents, crash calls or contact a specific medical specialist).
- Other aspects of communication involve, operation of the radio paging equipment, fire/bomb threat calls, arranging emergency journeys out of hours.
To read more information about the advertised role, and the main job duties/responsibilities please open the Job Description and Person Specification located under the supporting documents heading. You can also read more information about working at the Northern Care Alliance within the attached Candidate Information Pack or by visiting our careers website: careers.northerncarealliance.nhs.uk
Person Specification
Qualifications
Desirable
Experience
Essential
- oExperience of working in a busy environment where demands are high on call handling with a requisite to meet departmental pre-determined targets (KPI's).
- oThe individual must evidence any experience of working as a team player or on one's own initiative
- oExperience using computers for work purposes
Desirable
- oAny experience of working in a busy switchboard or call centre environment.
Skills
Essential
- oAbility to work as part of a team but at the same time be able to work on their own initiative.
- oFlexibility regarding rota cover including cover of night shifts on occasion: It is essential that the successful candidate is a people person, who can work often under pressure and with a clear understanding for the need to cover colleagues' shifts and duties for annual leave, sickness etc.
Desirable
- oGood administrative skills
- oGood IT skills.
- oIt is desirable that the successful candidate has previously undertaken flexible shift patterns.
Person Specification
Qualifications
Desirable
Experience
Essential
- oExperience of working in a busy environment where demands are high on call handling with a requisite to meet departmental pre-determined targets (KPI's).
- oThe individual must evidence any experience of working as a team player or on one's own initiative
- oExperience using computers for work purposes
Desirable
- oAny experience of working in a busy switchboard or call centre environment.
Skills
Essential
- oAbility to work as part of a team but at the same time be able to work on their own initiative.
- oFlexibility regarding rota cover including cover of night shifts on occasion: It is essential that the successful candidate is a people person, who can work often under pressure and with a clear understanding for the need to cover colleagues' shifts and duties for annual leave, sickness etc.
Desirable
- oGood administrative skills
- oGood IT skills.
- oIt is desirable that the successful candidate has previously undertaken flexible shift patterns.
Disclosure and Barring Service Check
This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.
Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).
From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).
Additional information
Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).
From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).