With thousands of infections daily, the outbreak of Omicron is troubling everyone in Hong Kong. Infected citizens and their family have been continuously calling the “StayHomeSafe” Scheme hotline, but are almost never getting answers for their concerns as the line is always busy.

As infection cases and the amount of people calling simultaneously increase at a staggering rate, how could we possibly get out of this vicious cycle?

Some may suggest to recruit more manpower for the hotline. However, it is far more complicated than many could have imagined. Apart from the recruitment process, people still have to be trained before they can handle calls competently. It takes more than a matter of hours.

More frustratingly, people could not even reach the telephone recording phase, as the line is always busy. After all, it is likely that the people’s concerns remain unanswered after minutes of waiting on the line.

At this point, the –QA model is your solution. The –QA model requires no additional resources to bring optimal improvements. By rearranging the process and reallocating the resources in hand, we can break the current deadlock at ease!

For example, the Cantonese and non-Cantonese enquiries can be separated into two different hotlines, reducing the process that requires citizens to choose the language. Moreover, we can prepare recordings for frequently asked questions in advance. With the help of these recordings, telephonists can answer citizens in no man-time and deal with other enquiries immediately. It reduces not only the citizens’ precious time to press the buttons, but also the possible occupation of the lines available.

Solve the problem from the root with the –QA model!