New York City’s 311 services are trying to meet New Yorkers where they are — on Twitter at all hours of the night.
The city plans to announce Thursday that 311’s Twitter account will be taking requests 24 hours a day, seven days a week. A pilot program launched last year allowed users to send complaints to 311’s Twitter account on weekdays, between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. During the pilot, the service saw a 76 percent jump in Twitter interactions, according to 311 executive director Joseph Morrisroe.
“With more and more New Yorkers using Twitter to talk to us, we’re strengthening our digital presence and increasing service to make sure your questions get answers,” he said in a statement.
Twitter users can send complaints to almost all nonemergency city services by tweeting @nyc311. The city will then prompt users to direct message further details so that the 311 operator can submit a request.
311 also plans to roll out a chat function for its some 500 available services.
The tweets and chats will be handled by 25 trained call center agents, according to the city. They will operate in shifts similar to those of phone operators to ensure 24/7 responses.
Last year, the agency saw a record number of 311 requests for the fourth year in a row. It received 39,935,837 requests, nearly 20 million of which were phone calls, according to the city. The most common 311 service request last year was for noise issues, with 450,916 requests made.
