More than a lone worker app: 7 ways Safepoint can keep your team organised and productive
Safepoint not only provides the most advanced lone worker solutions on the market, we also are focused on making businesses more productive while making life easier for remote and flexible workers.
Our first step towards this goal was to add our amazing team management features into the app, meaning you can keep track of your employees right from your phone!
The way we see it, the more our clients use Safepoint, the safer they are, so we want to make it as helpful as possible! Below we’ve compiled just some of the ways our clients use Safepoint to make their working lives easier and safer.
And if you have any ideas for how Safepoint can make running your business easier, please comment or get in touch, and we’ll pass it on to our engineers.
1. An easy check-in tool
When you have Safepoint, you don’t need to shell out on an expensive check-in system. With our app, it’s easy to check in and check out of a location, meeting or shift. You can even bring on temporary workers with our totally flexible licences.
When you are ready to start a new job, you can check in by creating a new task. You might call the task ‘Front of house shift’, or ‘Client meeting - 72 London Road’, and set up a task timer for how long the job is likely to take.
When you’re done, simply check out by ending your task. If your job looks like it’s going to overrun, you can simply extend the task.
Tips: This can be a handy tool when dealing with overtime pay. Using the app, workers can access their own shifts, should they need to show proof of working extra hours. Meanwhile, managers can oversee their entire team’s shifts, should they need to look into how many hours they are paying.
If you frequently work the same shift, you can save it as a ‘quick task’. To do so, simply set up a task as you would normally, and tick ‘Save as quick task’. A couple of taps at either end of your shift is a much more efficient way of checking in and out than ‘punching in’.
2. Remote collaboration
Tools like Zoom, Teams and Slack have made collaborating remotely much easier for people who work at a desk. For those who work ‘in the field’, however (such as engineers, estate agents, nurses and carers), collaborating can be much tricker – especially if your team works remotely, or flexibly. Luckily, Safepoint is working to make remote and flexible work less stressful, and more productive!
Safepoint’s in-app team management features make collaborating on the go much easier. Anyone with guardian permissions can open their Safepoint app and see their entire team’s location and status, all in one place.
Say you need help on a two-person job. You can open your app, see who’s nearby and what they’re working on.
For instance, Sarah might need help while she works up a ladder. She sees that John is only around the corner, and will be finished with his task in 10 minutes. She can tap on John’s icon on the map, bring up his phone number and give him a call. Simple!
Tip: It makes it easier to see who is and isn’t available to talk if workers are descriptive when creating a task. See our ‘Do not disturb’ section for more information.
3. Tracking commutes and those driving for work
Often, companies will want to track their employee’s driving time –either when they’re commuting to the office, or between site visits. Luckily, Safepoint can be used to monitor how much of the day is spent travelling, and what routes are taken. Some of our clients even reference Safepoint when working out their fuel costs.
Tracking commutes, work trips and uses of a company car can be a vital part of your company’s safety and logistics strategy, but building in new systems can be costly, instead, you should encourage your employees to run Safepoint when they’re on the move, in order to keep them safe and organised.
Tip: We recommend workers always use Safepoint when they’re travelling for work. Not only will this help with your team’s productivity, but it can also improve response times in the case of an emergency. This is important as up to a third of road accidents involve someone driving as part of their job!
4. Create a (paperless) paper trail
If your employees are on the road a lot of the time –or even if they make a lot of appointments, it’s important to keep a record of where they’ve been and for how long. Whether your team members are visiting another site, a client, or someone’s house, Safepoint can play a vital role in your appointment tracking and schedule management.
Take one of our clients, whose team makes house visits on a council contract. Not only does Safepoint help keep them safe while they’re working in someone’s home, but it also helps them provide a clear paper trail. On the occasions where they have had to prove they made a house visit, they can bring up the full task history on their app or computer and send it over.
For another one of our clients who provide security services, it’s important to show that the security guard has done a full sweep of their assigned premises. Safepoint allows them to go back to any point in the worker’s history and bring up their shift.
5. Do not disturb! –Using Safepoint for uninterrupted appointments
Safepoint makes it super easy to see what your team members are up to and to see who is available to talk. The only thing your team needs to do is be accurate with their task names and task lengths. For instance, if you want to have a quick check-in with one of your colleagues, you can just look at the Safepoint app and see what the user is up to and how long they will be busy.
If a worker is in a task that you don’t want to disturb, you can always leave them a note. Simply tap on the task, and then tap ‘Add note’.
Tip: There are even better ways to make sure someone is not disturbed when they’re doing vital work. If a worker is starting a task where they don’t want to be interrupted, they can indicate that in their task name. Some of our clients write “DND” (do not disturb), whereas others use an emoji. This is a quick and easy way to minimise disruptions during important meetings.
6. Staff location management – Make sure everyone is in the right place
For some organisations, it’s very important for staff to be in the right place at the right time. For instance, imagine the security and support staff working at a music event.
The organiser may want all of their team to be evenly distributed across the site. With Safepoint, a team leader can just open their phone and see who’s working where, and if there are any spaces that need to be filled.
The team leader may spot a couple of staff members who are too bunched up and send a note asking one of them to move to a different location. They can then watch as the staff member moves and takes up their new position. Remember, staff tracking is a vital part of staff management!
Tip: Our staff location functions aren’t just for outdoor jobs. Staff tracking software can be an important tool in your warehouse operations and other aspects of managing your supply chain. Whatever you buy, sell, store, or make, it’s important to know where your staff are.
7. Get up-to-date delivery tracking without logistics software
Safepoint can help you keep track of your couriers and drivers, at every stage of their delivery. Unlike vehicle tracking solutions, Safepoint stays with the driver, meaning that you can see every step of their journey, in real-time. Whether your team members are travelling by foot, bike, car, van or lorry, staff tracking can be vital to your business!
Safepoint is providing more and more driver-tracking solutions for companies that don’t want to pay for expensive logistics software. So, not only will your drivers be protected via a team of 24/7 emergency responders, you will also have an up-to-date view of their progress. So, if a customer calls and asks for an update on their delivery, you can tell them exactly where it is.