Footprint Solutions is providing lone workers at Golden Gates Housing Trust with an enhanced personal safety suite to safeguard them while working in the field. The implementation began in January 2014 and was completed by May, and was reported to have cost less than £100,000.
Golden Gates is the first housing provider to trial Footprint’s Protect module, developed in partnership with Guardian24, which allows them to integrate Footprint’s Housing Support Pro (HSP) solution and Guardian24’s personal security service onto tablets and smartphones.
Housing Support Pro assigns job appointments to each user, and when the user accepts the appointment, a corresponding Guardian24 lone worker activity record is created. The user can then log an estimated time for them to complete the appointment. If they overrun, the smartphone will call them to verify their safety; if they do not respond, an alert will be triggered which then follows the customer’s predefined escalation procedures.
If the worker thinks that they are in danger, they can raise a covert panic alert which is picked up by either an incident management centre, or a specific contact as defined by the escalation procedures.
Peter Fitzhenry, director of housing management, Golden Gates Housing Trust, said, “We recognise that lone workers have to deal with potentially difficult situations. By using the Protect module, we can offer enhanced protection for our staff, while also recognising the operational benefits of using the Housing Support Pro solution.”
