110, 120, 119 and 122: which Beijing emergency number fits which situation, what the dispatcher will ask, what an ambulance costs on the official tariff, and the paperwork insurers demand.
Nothing in a guidebook prepares you for the moment something actually goes wrong — a phone lifted on Line 1, a parent who cannot stand up at the Summer Palace, a scooter clipping your taxi at a hutong corner. The reflex to dial 911 or 112 gets you a recorded message. Beijing runs on its own four emergency numbers, they are free, and knowing which one fits which situation — plus what happens after you call — turns a bad hour into a manageable one. This guide covers the four core numbers, the hotline that serves foreigners best, what the dispatcher will ask, what an ambulance costs on the published Beijing tariff, and the paperwork you should collect before you leave the hospital. It does not replace travel insurance; it is the first hour, before any insurer gets involved.
All four are toll-free, all are answered 24 hours, all work from a Chinese SIM. Save them in your phone before you land rather than when you need them, and say them out loud once so they are in your head and not only in a locked screen.
You get a Chinese-speaking dispatcher who will ask three things in roughly this order: where you are, what happened, your phone number. Location is the part that defeats visitors — the dispatcher needs a road name and a district, not a landmark nickname. Give the name of the hotel, metro station, or shop you are standing at, plus the nearest cross street; those are unambiguous. If your Chinese is not up to it, say where you are and hand the phone to the nearest shopkeeper, security guard or taxi driver. In Beijing this is entirely normal and people almost always help. For theft or loss, go to the local police station (派出所, paichusuo) and ask for the written case receipt — usually called 受案回执 or 报警回执, with the exact wording varying by station. Your travel insurer will very likely require it, and it is far easier to obtain on the day than by email from home three weeks later. For a lost passport the consular steps are separate; see our guide to losing your passport in Beijing.
Beijing is unusual in running a second emergency medical number alongside 120: 999, operated by the Beijing Red Cross emergency rescue service. In practice 120 has the larger fleet and is the default; if 120 is engaged or you cannot get through, 999 is a legitimate second attempt rather than a wrong number. Ambulances are not free. On the tariff published by the Beijing Emergency Center, the transfer charge is a ¥70 base fee covering the first 3 km plus ¥7 for each kilometre beyond, and a separate ¥80 pre-hospital emergency fee applies if the crew treats you on the spot. A stair carry in a building without a lift adds ¥50 plus ¥20 per floor. Treatment inside the emergency department is billed separately by the hospital. None of this is negotiated at the roadside — you settle it at the hospital and claim it back. Treat the figures as the current published tariff; they are revised from time to time.
Beijing drivers are slower than the traffic looks, but scooters and delivery bikes appear silently and from the wrong direction. For any accident with injury, call 122 and 120 together. Photograph before anything moves: both vehicles, both number plates, the position on the road, the damage, and the other driver. For a minor bump with nobody hurt, local convention is to photograph and pull the cars out of the flow rather than block a lane waiting for police. Do not accept cash on the spot from a driver who wants to avoid insurance — you have no way to judge whether the number covers a hospital visit tomorrow, and no paperwork afterwards. Take their phone number, plate and insurer, and call 122 so an official record exists. If you are in a taxi or a Didi, the driver deals with their own vehicle; your concerns are the passenger injury and that record.
Beijing's 12345 city services hotline runs 24 hours, is free, and — unlike the emergency numbers — has English-speaking operators on duty around the clock, with other languages handled through a three-way call with interpreters, eight languages in total. It is not for someone who is collapsing. It is the right number for nearly everything else: a shop that refuses a refund, an online booking form that will not accept a foreign passport, a question about a visa rule you cannot get a straight answer to, a bag left on a train, or simply being unable to make yourself understood and needing a human who can. There is also a 12345 Online channel inside the 京通 and GO BEIJING ecosystem if you would rather type than talk. Save 12345 next to 110 — for a stranded visitor it is often the more useful of the two.
The four emergency numbers are toll-free and, on a Chinese SIM, reachable even with no credit left. On a foreign roaming SIM or a travel eSIM the behaviour is less predictable: some carriers connect you to an operator, some to a recorded message. Confirm with your carrier before you fly if you intend to rely on one, and in any case know the fallback — every hotel reception, corner shop and taxi driver in Beijing will dial for you, and that is faster than fighting with a roaming plan. The genuinely dangerous scenario is a flat battery. Keep your hotel's Chinese name and address as a lock-screen screenshot and on a paper card in your wallet; that single piece of information is what a dispatcher needs most and what a dead screen takes away.
Chinese hospitals are fast and inexpensive by Western standards, and they run pay-as-you-go. In the emergency department you register (挂号) at the window with your passport, pay a registration and consultation fee, then pay for each test, scan and prescription before you receive it. Carry working Alipay or WeChat Pay and ¥2,000–¥3,000 of accessible headroom, which covers the large majority of emergency visits. Before you leave the building, collect four things: the 门诊病历 (outpatient record), the 诊断证明 (diagnosis certificate), every 发票 (fapiao — the official tax invoice), and the itemised receipts. Insurers reject claims on documentation grounds far more often than on medical grounds, and the diagnosis certificate in particular is much easier to get while you are still standing at the counter than by email a month later.
The scam that actually costs visitors money in Beijing is not the teahouse trick. It is the phone call from someone claiming to be police, customs or a consulate, saying a parcel in your name was intercepted or that there is a problem with your visa, and asking you to verify your bank details or move money to a safe account. Chinese authorities do not operate that way. Hang up. If you are unsure whether a call was real, dial 110 yourself rather than calling the number you were given, or call 96110 — the official anti-telecom-fraud hotline, which exists precisely to check whether a call you received was genuine. Never transfer money to an individual, and never read a verification code aloud to someone who phoned you.