The Story
Moorabool Shire Council recognized that some of their staff were being exposed to a number of risks during their working day and wanted to ensure they had some form of protection whilst working by themselves. Nurses frequently conduct home visits alone to check on new mothers and give immunization jabs. Similarly, statutory planners often have to do site inspections at different locations. Employees who work out in the community can often face risks such as violent or hostile behaviour from the public.
Although it was encouraged for staff to work in pairs, this wasn’t always possible. After an incident where a worker became unwell at work and had to call a supervisor to let them know, Moorabool Shire Council decided to look into solutions that could give staff a way to quickly signal for help should they need to.
Prior to the Lone Worker App, powered by StaySafe, the council relied on supervisors conducting regular check-ins with staff to ensure their safety and wellbeing but managers soon realised that this system wasn’t robust enough and decided to look for something more sophisticated. As Moorabool Shire Council is a regional authority, staff are often working in areas that are rural with limited signal coverage. This opens up a number of new risks as staff may find it difficult to call for help during an incident. After a successful trial with EcoOnline's lone worker solution, powered by StaySafe, Moorabool Shire Council decided to adopt it into the organization.
Since partnering with EcoOnline, employees can now use the app to check-in with managers and let them know they are safe throughout their working day. EcoOnline's lone worker app, powered by StaySafe, allows employees to start a timed session within the app before beginning a period of lone work or travel, if an employee fails to end their session safely, a session expiry alert will be sent to the monitor.
EcoOnline's lone worker app, powered by StaySafe, panic feature allows staff to send an alert when they feel threatened and assistance can then be sent to their exact location. A panic alert can also be triggered discreetly using the phone’s power button, allowing an alert to be raised from the user’s pocket or handbag without the assailant knowing. This is a great feature for staff who often have to work out in the community where environments can be unpredictable. EcoOnline's lone worker app, powered by StaySafe, man down alert ensures that if an employee has not moved for a period of time, a non-movement alert is triggered in case there has been an accident.
For staff that work in rural areas with little to no coverage, EcoOnline's lone worker app, powered by StaySafe, offers a low signal mode which allows communications to be sent to the hub via SMS. Alerts and session functions will continue to operate as usual, with location data updating if an alert is triggered.
Ajay Ramdas, Risk Officer at Moorabool Shire Council comments, “there’s been a good response from our staff since introducing EcoOnline, particularly from the nurses who use the app whenever they conduct home visits. EcoOnline's team were fantastic during the implementation process and both Matt and Sylvia made sure to answer any questions we had. Both staff and supervisors feel confident that if an incident does occur, we have the necessary protection in place to ensure our employees are kept safe.”
