Review into 105 White pages placement

The police details listed in the Tauranga White pages. Photo. Supplied.

Yellow and the police will review potential changes to their directory to facilitate the use of 105 in the White pages publications.

It follows a member of the Tauranga community's struggles to get in touch about a non-emergency police incident.

A concerned Bethlehem resident, who wished not to be named, was hoping to call the local police station and discuss issues, including speeding, that are happening in his area.

Being something of a self-confessed technophobe, the resident went to his trusted White pages.

Realising the incident was not an emergency he instead wished to call the local station directly and file a report.

But the White pages no longer list the individual phone numbers for respective stations. All that is listed under police was 111, the emergency contact number.

'Probably if I went online I would find things differently and better but most of us old guys haven't really got much idea about that,” the resident says.

'It's out of date. It's an old fashioned method. But it is the first port of call for the elderly amongst us of which, I am part of the club.

'It is not a giveaway how to get in touch with them. There is plenty of ways to get in touch with them when the blood is flowing but if it is not an emergency it is difficult.”

A spokesperson for the police confirmed that more in depth police contact details are listed in the Government Department contacts section, including the 105 non-emergency contact details.

'We did do lots of advertising on radio and TV at the time when 105 launched in 2019,” says a police spokesperson.

'It is still new as a number, only 18 months old. We did try to reach different people across different mediums.”

Yellow, who publish the White pages, have clarified that a review will take place over the placement of the police contacts in the next publication.

'We work closely with police to ensure they understand the needs of people looking up police information in the White pages,” says Kelly Duncan, Yellow's head of enablement.

'The police ultimately decide the information they deem appropriate to list. We are really happy to continue to work alongside the police to ensure consistency across regions and to adjust listing content if they need to for the community.

'This is great timely feedback for the upcoming Bay of Plenty book which we will review with police and make any appropriate content changes.”

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1 comment

I never knew about 105 until I read this story.

Posted on 03-03-2021 15:38 | By morepork

I use a computer every day but I don't use a cell phone. I can easily understand how there can be people who don't know about the "non-emergency" number. White (and to a lesser extent, perhaps...) yellow pages are still used by many people. I was glad to see that a Google search on "non-emergency Police number" DOES return the 105 page at the top of the search list. I guess it is more about awareness than reference.


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