The City of Avondale is seeking proposals from qualified, licensed firms to provide professional telephone answering services for the support of the City's operations, activities, and programs during night, holiday, weekend hours, or on an as-needed basis. The selected contractor will be responsible for providing after-hours telephone answering services for the Public Works Department and Traffic Engineering Department, as well as online submission form services for the City's employee integrity line. The contractor will be required to provide live operators stationed at 24-hour centers who can forward phone messages, faxes, and emails to designated staff and have the ability to judge the severity of important calls that require immediate response. The contractor will also be required to provide a dedicated toll-free phone line for the integrity line and a public website address for online submission form services. Key requirements include: • Answering 80% of calls within 120 seconds and 95% of calls within 180 seconds • Providing evidence of a back-up system to ensure uninterrupted answering services • Having a minimum of one Spanish-speaking call taker on duty for each shift • Keeping the average call duration time to 3.5 minutes per incoming call on a monthly basis • Providing monthly reports with talk time stats for all calls by day, time, and call type • Forwarding a report showing all call activity at the end of each shift or after the phones are released back to the department during normal working hours