Lone Worker Tracking / Safety Apps

Pross

Does anyone have any experience of using any of the smartphone apps out there for employee tracking / lone workers? Our business often requires staff to go out on site visits that can be in quite remote areas and we currently have a system of staff checking in when arriving at and leaving site (plus when leaving and arriving back home if they aren't going to or from the office) but that relies too much on individuals remembering to a) check in and b) check up if they fail to check in.

I've seen a few options with Stay Safe seeming to do what we need i.e. if you don't check in at the expected time an automatic alert gets sent out and the person also has the option to hit a panic button if something happens while they are out. I'd be interested to hear from anyone who has used this app or anything similar.

laurentian

Don't know the ins and outs of it but have you seen "flexr"? I think it may do what you want and a lot more but never used it myself

https://flexr.com/

Matthewfalle

a very lovely friend of mine is a respiratory specialist in the US and as part of the job is to go to people's houses by herself.

5'1 of blonde loveliness.

she has a check in & out thing that she uses. She also has a 9mm and a carry license but I suspect this may be slightly unnecessary for your needes.

cougie

There's a phone app life 360 ? Free version is ok. Paid for has lots more options.

Pross

Thanks all, I'm having a demo of Stay Safe tomorrow. Of all the ones I've looked at it seems the closest to what I would have asked for if I was having it developed from scratch. Most of the others I've seen do a full link to timesheets, expenses etc. which we don't need and some feel a bit 'big brother' and snooping which I'm keen to avoid (just want something to help with staff safety rather than monitoring them which looks like they aren't trusted).

Thanks MF for the 9mm suggestion but I wouldn't let most of my colleagues loose with a spud gun!

me-109

It is a few years since I looked at this for lone working and to provide some assurance travelling staff. Options include various devices with panic buttons if you are in the business of dealing with Joe Public house calls or remote surveying. These alert a control centre who are able to arrange response, usually directing services from the last reported GPS ping.

Typically the whole system fails because the organisation is not geared to dealing with the situation. Out of hours someone always needs to be on call either to communicate with the lone worker or to escalate the situation. What happens if someone doesn't report in or has an issue? Do they get paid for their own out of hours time etc? Do you have an escalation route identified internally and externally for different scenarios and potential criticality? If someone is travelling a fair distance they could use any number of routes - how can you escalate to the police when you may not even know which force to contact?

Implementation is fraught with issues - Big Brother as you say. Vehicle tracking is easier because you are tracking the asset, but vehicles with personal use present more problems around privacy.

navrig2

We gave up on mobile phone apps as they relied too heavily on a data signal especially if someone was in distress and couldn't actually communicate. In the highlands and island of Scotland data signal can be very limited.

We have moved to this system: https://skyguard.co.uk/

It uses the GPS signal, mobile phone network (any) and the satellite phone system. Probably more costly than using staff or company mobile phones but it should be more effective.