Charity Shortlisted For National Award After Work With Peoplesafe

1 Nov 2015

A charity which helps families across England has been shortlisted for a national award, thanks to its work with Peoplesafe. Family Action works with more than 45,000 families affected by poverty, disadvantage or social isolation.

The awards ceremony on November 25 at the Park Lane Hilton in London will be hosted by comedian Jimmy Carr. Family Action has been shortlisted in the best deployment of lone worker technology category.The charity, which has its headquarters in London, offers a range of services that support the emotional health and wellbeing of individuals and families. Some are based in centres, but others are out in the community.

Chris Aslett, facilities manager at Family Action, said: “Working with vulnerable and hard to reach families doesn’t always go to plan, so we have to make sure we have systems in place to keep our staff safe.“We used to rely on a simple ‘buddy’ system, where colleagues would ring each other at the end of a shift to confirm safety, but we realised as a responsible employer that was not enough.”

Family Action turned to Peoplesafe, which provides an NSI Gold accredited service, the highest possible industry recognition, which is fully compliant with the British Standard for lone worker provision (BS8484).Peoplesafe, which has its headquarters in Yorkshire, helped Family Action with lone worker policies and training, and supplied equipment in the form of the Identicom device.

The Identicom, looks like a name badge, but has a hidden alarm button and GPS locator, which link back to Peoplesafe’s 24/7 monitoring centre, so people can easily be found in an emergency.

Chris said: “Staff now feel they are protected when working alone and on the few occasions that an incident has occurred the situation has been dealt with effectively and without risk to the user.”

The Identicom is one of a range of products supplied by Peoplesafe, which is one of the UK’s leading providers of simple and lightweight equipment, training and monitoring services for lone workers. Its clients include major retailers, house builders, housing associaitons and facilities management companies.

Peoplesafe managing director Ian Johannessen said: “We are delighted that Family Action has been shortlisted for this award.“Their staff do vital work with families and it is only right that they should be properly protected. There are millions of lone workers doing important jobs, whether they are working in social services, working in shops, protecting premises or delivering goods. These are all vital jobs and all the personnel deserve protecting.”