City of Edinburgh Council

The Challenges

The City of Edinburgh Council employs security personnel who respond alone to raised intruder alarms at services ran by the council such as schools, libraries and, museums. The nature of this work means the council must ensure the safety of these employees by adopting a suitable lone worker policy as a vital health and safety measure.

The council originally had an unsatisfactory lone worker solution in place that involved two separate dedicated devices; one to manually raise a panic alarm and one to record the guards’ site patrols.

This was not a practical safety measure for the security guards because they had to carry the two devices around, plus a mobile phone, at all times, and ensure both were always fully charged.

Another important consideration was the ability to link a lone worker solution directly to their internal Alarm Receiving Centre rather than outsourcing to a third party to manage panic alarms, and thereby saving an unnecessary expense.

In 2014, The City of Edinburgh Council took the decision to review its lone worker measures in order to understand if there was a better solution available that would combine all three lone working functionalities on one device with the ability to manage alarms internally.

The Solution

Following extensive research into lone worker solutions, the council chose to implement Crystal Ball’s MobileLWP across its security division in late 2014.

Crystal Ball was specifically chosen because its panic alarm functionality and location visibility are both available using a single smartphone app.

With MobileLWP now in place, The City of Edinburgh Council is able to effectively monitor the welfare and safety of its guards through one simple smartphone application. The guards can now conveniently and discretely raise a panic alarm if necessary, automatically notifying the councils internal Alarm Receiving Centre at which point alarms are managed accordingly. With Crystal Ball, management now have the ability to monitor employees’ locations in real time while guards are working alone.

The Outcome

The implementation of MobileLWP now enables council security management to monitor the safety of the guards without the inconvenience or hindrance of the old devices.

Ian McPhee, Security Services Manager, comments:

“The combination of a mobile phone and lone worker solution on one device is very convenient and exactly what we were looking for. The guards no longer have to carry around two separate devices. This makes raising an alarm or contacting somebody much simpler if needs be, plus the app is very user-friendly. We also see the beauty in being able to handle alarms internally without the need of a third party Alarm Receiving Centre.”

Ian comments further on the recent Health and Safety Audit conducted by the council’s Health and Safety division:

“We recently had our Health and Safety Audit. This is carried out in order to validate that the necessary risk assessments and equipment, for example, are in place to safeguard our staff by keeping them as safe as possible. Edinburgh council’s health and safety division reviewed Crystal Ball’s MobileLWP solution and were very pleased that we are adhering to health and safety policy. Having Crystal Ball in place has certainly helped us pass the audit. We are hoping to roll out Crystal Ball’s app across the entire council as we believe it is something all divisions should have to ensure the safety of their staff.”

Additional Comments

“The combination of a mobile phone and lone worker solution on one device is very convenient and exactly what we were looking for.”