On-Call Public Health Emergency Call Center Services

The vendor is required to provide that on-call public health emergency call center services need to comprehensive call center services to new yorkers.
- Scope of program services
• Program expectations
o At the health department’s request, the contractor would operate a public health call center that would provide the following direct client services:
o Information about diseases and conditions which may include, but not be limited to, guidance on disease testing, quarantine, vaccination, available treatments.
o Responses to questions about isolation, quarantine, risks associated with travel from regions with active outbreaks, indications for vaccination and treatment, side effects, and other issues related to the public health emergency.
o Outreach to vulnerable populations to connect them with health resources and ensure equitable access to health information during public health emergencies.
o Assistance in accessing public health resources and health care services.
o Up-to-date information about city and city public health initiatives as well as local, state, and national health guidelines and restrictions.
o Clinical consultation to healthcare providers calling for public health guidance.
o Within seven calendar days of the health department’s request, the contractor would stand-up a fully operational public health call center. this includes hiring, onboarding, training, and deploying an adequate staff of clinicians, non-clinical customer service representatives, it supports staff, and quality assurance managers.
o The contractor would make and receive high volumes of monthly outbound and inbound calls (telephone, video messaging, text messaging, email, and other chat), along with resources and systems to accommodate individuals without internet access, those with limited english proficiency, or those with disabilities.
o The contractor would provide services in languages other than english as required. the languages prescribed by local law 30 of 2017 are Spanish, Chinese, Russian, Bengali, Haitian creole, Korean, Arabic, Urdu, French, Yiddish, Italian and polish, and any additional languages as required by the health department.
o The contractor would receive and respond to inbound communications and place outbound communications using guides and training provided by the health department on various health topics to ensure the delivery of accurate, up-to-date and consistent information to the public.
o All communications with callers must be directly provided by a human clinician and/or customer service representative unless otherwise approved by the health department.
o  The contractor would provide services to members of the public who may not have internet access. for example, the contractor will access URLS to schedule online appointments on behalf of callers, review online public health tools provide other health guidance resources, and locate information on the health department protocols, city, state, and federal recommendations, and official guidance.
o Within 14 calendar days of the health department’s request, the contractor would scale down/end call center operations.
o During peak emergencies as defined by the health department, the contractor would staff and operate the call center seven (7) days/week, from 7:00am-11:00pm.
o Hours of operation may be changed to respond to increased or decreased demand.
o Call center operations, including staffing, will be remote but must be in the united states.
o At times of highest volume during an emergency response, the contractor may expect to receive approximately 15,000-20,000 inbound calls per month from the public and health care providers and make an estimated 5,000-10,000 outbound calls per month for targeted public health initiatives.
o The contractor would, as necessary at the health department’s request, provide call center services for multiple simultaneous public health emergencies; such requests would follow the timeframes indicated above.
o In their proposal, the proposer would detail how they would handle staffing up and maintaining call center services during multiple public health emergencies
o The contractor would provide a robust call center system with all necessary applications compliant with the health department division of information technologies and state office of technology innovation’s (OTI’S) requirements and would be able to:
o Receive thousands of inbound calls per month, including those from toll-free telephone numbers programmed to direct calls to the call center;
o Place thousands of outbound calls per month locally, nationally, and internationally appearing on caller id as coming from the "state department of health";
o receive and write emails, text messages, and other chats;
o Manage and modify call volume as requested by the agency;
o Generate detailed reports and data exports/extracts of call center activities;
o Search for and find calls/communications based on parameters such as call time, phone number, name, call disposition, etc.
o Transfer calls, as needed, to another call center, the health department staff, and call centers operated by state and other partner organizations
o The contractor would maintain detailed call records in accordance with the standards set out in the city’s boilerplate contract, also referred to as general provisions governing contracts for consultants, professional, technical, human and client services.
o The contractor would manage and ensure the quality of call center operations by monitoring performance and taking actions to improve service quality.
o The contractor would meet with the health department program staff on a routine basis while call center activities are operational to discuss operations, changes to services, corrective actions, and more.
o The contractor will attend ad hoc meetings as needed relevant to implementing this contract
- Contract Period/Term: 6 years
- Non-Mandatory Pre-Proposal Conference Date: January 23, 2025
- Questions/Inquires Deadline: January 30, 2025