features
 
 
Lone Worker Duress Alarm

Many business owners are becoming increasingly concerned about staff who work alone on business premises, often outside normal working hours. Not only are they concerned about staff welfare but they also recognise the legal liability that this entails.

General legal obligations of employers under the Occupational Health and Safety Act (2004) apply and state that "An employer shall provide and maintain so far as is reasonably practicable for employees a working environment that is safe and without risks to health".

WorkSafe authorities recommend that such workers have access to a duress alarm in order that help may be summoned quickly should an incident occur.

The PANDAH Personal Alert System is well suited to this, allowing a worker to carry a pendant whilst moving around or checking otherwise deserted workplaces.

However PANDAH goes much further than this in providing a mechanism whereby workers are required to regularly "check in" to confirm that they are OK.

The Welfare Monitoring section describes how the PANDAH system may be configured to monitor the wellbeing of users at pre-defined times during the day.

The Lone Worker feature allows Welfare Monitoring to be configured to issue welfare checks every half-hour, every hour etc. whilst the system is in the "Home" mode.

  
     
 

Should regular monitoring no longer be required, the Home/Away button may be pressed on the Pandahlink base unit to place the system in Away mode.

This would be done when the worker is ready to leave the premises.

  

When a welfare check time occurs, the system signals the worker's pendant with audible beeps and light flashes. Pressing the OK button will confirm that all is OK and no further action is taken.
However if the OK button is not pressed within 45 seconds, the system sends an alert SMS text message that the worker failed to check in with the system at that time.

Optionally an SMS may be sent whenever the Home/Away button is pressed thereby signalling when the employee "checks in" and terminates their "lone worker" shift.

Working alone is working anywhere a person is unable to get immediate assistance from colleagues or other people. This can increase the likelihood of some workplace hazards or risks occurring and when incidents occur, the consequences can be more severe when people work alone.

Workers who perform hazardous work alone, without routine interaction with other workers and the public, may be unable to get immediate help. Whilst the primary prevention strategy is to control the hazards associated with the work, a suitable duress alarm system should be considered so as to summon help quickly should an incident occur.