It is vitally important that everyone can get swift help in an emergency, so RNID are working with the Government and telecommunications companies to develop a UK-wide system which will allow you to send an SMS text message to the emergency services from a mobile phone.

A pilot service will start on 14 September and we need many people with a hearing loss to help us test the service if they need to make a real emergency call.

Please don’t try to use or register for the service before 14 September, but if you would like to take part then there are two ways that you can register for this user trial:

From your computer, go to http://www.emergencysms.org.uk/ (external link, opens new browser window).  This website will allow you to register to use the service and will hopefully answer all of your questions.

Or

From your mobile phone, text 'register' and send it to 999. You will be sent terms and conditions, once you have accepted these you will be able to use the service.

If you would like further information on the service then please contact the RNID Information Line who will send you an explanatory leaflet, or you can download the emergencySMS leafet - PDF - 188KB.

Please note, you will only have access to this service for the duration of the pilot and unless you register your mobile you won’t be able to use SMS text to contact the emergency services.

If these trials are a success then we hope that the national emergency SMS service will be launched in 2010.