Running an Ambulance Service: Dispatch Times, Vehicles, Dues

• 01The control room logs when a call arrived but not when a vehicle left. The owner cannot say whether dispatch takes four minutes or fourteen, or whether nights run slower.
• 02One or two vehicles run every shift while others wait at the base, because the dispatcher sends whichever driver picks up the phone first.
• 03Hospital tie-ups send patients every week and pay in lumps, so nobody can say which hospital owes how much for which trips.
• 04Vehicles go to the workshop with no record of how long they stay, and a breakdown is noticed only when a call finds no vehicle free.
• 05Drivers and attendants are rostered by memory, with overtime and night allowances settled by argument at month end.

• Call-to-dispatch minutes

  For each trip, dispatch time less call time. Add them up by shift and divide by trips in that shift.

• Vehicle hours on trip

  Hours from dispatch to return for each vehicle, divided by hours the vehicle was meant to be available.

• Hospital dues outstanding

  Trips billed to each tie-up less money received from it, listed by bill date.

• Workshop days per vehicle

  Days each vehicle was off the road in the month, from the workshop slip, divided by days in the month.

Half the fleet's hours were idle, 252 of 504. Only part of that time could ever be sold as trips. At a made-up ₹600 a trip hour, every 100 idle hours that did find work would add ₹60,000.

• 01Reading one average for call-to-dispatch minutes across all shifts, when the night figure is the one that families notice.
• 02Adding a vehicle because calls were missed, before looking at vehicle hours on trip and finding idle ones at base.
• 03Letting hospital dues roll on one running balance, so no one can say which trips are unpaid.

• 01Call time, dispatch time and arrival time logged for every trip, with the gaps shown by shift
• 02Hours on trip against hours available for each vehicle and each crew
• 03A receivables list by hospital tie-up, trip by trip, with the date each bill went out
• 04Workshop days per vehicle, with the cause and the repair bill beside it
• 05A crew roster with night and overtime rules written once and applied the same way
• 06Fuel and oil use per vehicle per hundred kilometres, compared across the fleet
• 07Walk-in and private bookings priced separately from tie-up trips, so the mix is visible
• 08A short Monday summary that the owner and control-room lead read together, built from the week's log

1. For the last week, write each call's arrival time and dispatch time on one sheet. Subtract and average by day and night shift. The gap between the two averages is your first question.
2. Hypothetical example: if the day shift took 40 calls with 240 minutes between call and dispatch, that is 6 minutes a call. If the night shift took 20 calls with 180 minutes, that is 9. Together 60 calls and 420 minutes give 7 minutes, which hides the night.
3. List every tied-up hospital with the trips billed and the amount received. The difference is what each owes you.
4. Note which vehicles were in the workshop last month and for how many days each.

1. First call: you describe the business and the numbers you already track.
2. Your first sheet: the one described under What you get, built from your own books.
3. The rhythm: a regular review of call-to-dispatch minutes, vehicle hours on trip, hospital dues outstanding, workshop days per vehicle.
4. What you hold at the end: a written sheet and a named owner for each number.

• Operations & Process Audit

  We walk through how work really flows in your business, from order to delivery, and identify the delays, rework, errors and handoffs costing you money.

• Business Audit

  Operations & Process Audit is part of Business Audit. See the full service if the problem is wider than one piece.

• I cannot see how my business is really performing

  If you steer by bank balance and gut feel, you are driving blind. See how a few trusted numbers, a monthly report and a review meeting fix that.

• Our processes are unclear and work depends on individuals

  When quality and delivery change with who is on duty, the process lives in people, not in the business. See how to write it down and standardise it.

• How this differs from Hospitals

  A hospital runs beds, departments and billing in one building; a transport service has no beds and lives on dispatch speed, vehicle hours and tie-up receivables.

• How this differs from Pathology labs

  A lab collects samples on routes and runs on test volume and report time; a transport service moves patients and runs on call-to-dispatch minutes and vehicle hours.