A call at eleven at night from a tour leader in Croatia
It is your turn with the duty phone. At 11pm the tour leader in Split rings: a passenger has had a fall, is at the hospital with her husband, and they will miss the ferry tomorrow. The leader needs to know the couple's insurance details, whether you can change their hotel for the next two nights, and who at the ferry company to tell.
You are at home with the duty phone and your own mobile. The booking system is not accessible outside the office. The supplier contacts are in a spreadsheet on the shared drive. You do what you can from memory and a few emails, and leave a long message for the office. In the morning, the operations manager rings you to ask what exactly was agreed.
The duty phone travels, but the information does not
An out-of-hours duty rota is common in small operators, often shared by the owner and senior staff. The phone moves between them. The information the duty person needs sits in office systems that are hard to reach from a kitchen table at night.
- Departures on the road, leaders and passenger lists are in the office system.
- Supplier contacts and references are in a separate spreadsheet.
- Passenger emergency and insurance details are not accessible remotely.
- Calls and decisions are recorded in texts, notes or not at all.
- Handover to the office in the morning relies on memory.
How you respond to emergencies, and what your procedures say, is for your own policies and advisers. This is about giving the duty person the information and a record.
Slow answers when speed matters most
An out-of-hours call is usually a problem that needs an answer now: a missed connection, a hotel that has lost a booking, a passenger taken ill. When the duty person has to hunt for details, the leader waits, and so do the passengers. Decisions made at night without a record can be repeated or contradicted in the morning.
The rota itself also suffers. Staff dread their turn with the phone when it means working blind, and that is a strain in a small team.
A duty setup that brings the office to the phone
We build a secure duty view and call log for whoever holds the phone.
- A duty screen, on phone or laptop behind a secure login, lists every departure currently on the road: tour, day of itinerary, leader and their number, and tonight's hotel.
- Opening a departure shows passengers, emergency contacts and insurance details where held, rooming, and the next few days' supplier bookings with contact numbers and references.
- Calls are logged in a few taps: who called, which departure, what happened, what was agreed and what needs doing. Voice notes are transcribed.
- Actions for the office (rebook a hotel night, contact the insurer on the passenger's behalf if that is your process, update the ferry company) become tasks visible first thing.
- The duty handover is automatic: at the start of the office day, a summary of the night's calls and open tasks goes to the operations team.
- The rota itself is held in the same place, so the duty number can divert to the right person and everyone knows who is on.
- Access is limited to staff on duty, and each view of passenger details is recorded.
| Duty need | Before | With the duty setup |
|---|---|---|
| Which departures are on the road | Memory or a printed list | Live list |
| Passenger and emergency details | In the office system | On the duty screen |
| Supplier contacts for tomorrow | Spreadsheet on a shared drive | With the departure |
| Record of the call | Texts and notes | Call log with actions |
| Morning handover | Phone call to the duty person | Summary and tasks |
The same call with the duty view
When the tour leader rings at 11pm, the duty person opens the Split departure, sees the couple's details and insurance reference, and the next two hotels and the ferry booking with their contacts. They agree with the leader what to do tonight, log the call, and raise two tasks: rebook the couple's next two nights and tell the ferry operator in the morning.
At 8.30am the operations team has the summary and the tasks. Nobody needs to ring the duty person to ask what happened, and the duty person can start their day without re-telling the story.
Does your duty phone work blind?
- The duty person cannot see booking details outside the office.
- Supplier contacts are in a spreadsheet on a shared drive.
- Out-of-hours calls are recorded in texts or not at all.
- The morning handover is a phone call to the duty person.
- Staff dread their turn on the duty rota.