Oxford City outfits housing employees with tracking and recording badges
New technology allows rent collectors to quietly raise the alarm during a confrontation; push a button and an open channel is created; conversations are recorded for legal purposes; Connexion2, Vodafone, and Identicom provide the technology
England’s council estates — what we Yankees call housing projects — can be extremely unpleasant places to work. As it is with any landlord, if there is any reason to meet with a tenant something bad has happened, and one can be sure that the tenant is not going to be in a good mood. Managing anti-social behaviour, collecting rents and arrears, responging to domestic violence, and handling pet problems are all in a day’s work for council estate staff, and it leaves them in a constant state of agitation and fear for their own safety.
Oxford City, however, has decided to do something about it. The city council has outfitted twenty-two of its employees with lone worker protection badges provided by Connexion2 and manufactured by Identicom. The badges contain alert buttons that can be pushed inobtrusively so as not to exacerbate a touchy situation. One of the buttons summons security, while a second not only sends an alarm but also opens a live channel with an emergency operator. All recordings are saved for future prosecution.
-read more in this Security Park report
