The benefit of relationships with competing EMS providers
Imagine you run an EMS company with three trucks.
You'd like to keep all your trucks busy all day, which means keeping a full call schedule... but not too full or else patients will be forced to wait. Therefore this is your ideal call schedule:
It's a nice, smooth, even distribution of calls. All three trucks can stay busy all day long. The calls come one or two at a time, leaving a bit of room for earlier calls to run late. It's perfect.
Unfortunately, it is usually impossible to rearrange patients' dialysis schedules, because the dialysis centers work so hard to keep their own schedules full. So if several dialysis patients get clustered together, your call schedule then looks like this:
Three calls at 09:00. If there is any delay whatsoever -- as EMS agencies know, there always is -- then they will be late for their 10:00 pickups. Likewise the three calls at 13:00 and the closely following call at 14:00.
To make matters worse, there are also the random, unfortunately-timed trips to doctors' offices, as well as the last-minute work-ins. If you also provide ER transportation, then you've got to be always ready to send a crew straight over, lest the facility be required to make an expensive call to 911 rather than wait on you to free up a truck. Your daily call schedule may end up looking like this:
How do you cover those calls with just three trucks?
This is the Peak Load Problem.
It weighs on all EMS companies, but it weighs the heaviest on small EMS companies.
The smaller your fleet, the bigger the problem.
As your customer base grows larger, the variance of your call schedule will begin to smooth out. There will still be surges -- unexpected bursts of two or three additional calls -- but they are far easier to manage: with fifteen trucks in the field, there are always nearby crews that can be juggled. Whereas if you have just three trucks, and two of them are stuck downtown on wait-and-return calls, then you have nothing to juggle with.
It Helps to Have Part-Time and On-Call Employees
If you have spare trucks, then you can arrange part-time or on-call employees to help you cover the peak loads.
There may be EMTs and paramedics who live near your station(s), that can be contracted to come in only when needed. Your current full-time employees may know some people who would be good candidates.
On-demand/on-call crews may demand above-market rates (perhaps 20% higher)... and you'll need quite a few of them in your rolodex, because they will often be busy at their regular jobs. If you can find, say, ten on-call candidates, then you will always have one or two available at any given time.
This even works for ER calls. In order to respond immediately to an ER call at 08:30, send the truck that is standing by for a dialysis patient at 09:00, and call in the reserves to take the dialysis call, giving them time to get dressed and drive in.
You Need Allies, Even If They Are Competitors
The peak load problem means that all small and medium EMS companies need allies, who can cover their calls during a peak load.
Fortunately your competitors are suffering from the same problem and may be receptive to a call-sharing arrangement... assuming they don't already have several in place.
Rolling Calls is Easy in AngelTrack
AngelTrack's dispatch system was built with affiliates in mind. It is exceptionally easy for your dispatchers to assign, reassign, and unassign calls from your affiliates.
You can configure each affiliate's service level, headquarters location, and hours of operation. AngelTrack takes all of that into account when presenting a list of available affiliates to a dispatcher who is deciding who to assign a call to. The chosen affiliate will receive an automatic email from AngelTrack giving the details of the call. Your affiliates can also use the Customer Portal to see a live dispatch board showing everything assigned to them -- now and in the future.
To learn more about how AngelTrack handles affiliate relationships, read the Affiliates guide.