Reduce sickness days, fulfill your duty of care and raise staff morale with a BlueRanger lone worker system
A 2002 study of workplace violence showed that 1.3 million people in the UK each year are attacked at work, leading to 3 million days off, and that's increasing year on year at 5% year on year (BBC). Given 29.1 million people in work, that's 3.4% of us.
The chance of you or your employees being caught in a workplace violence incident is greatly increased in particular industries. The following workers are at greater risk:
- taxi drivers
- health visitors
- home helps, care assistants and cleaners
- meter readers
- delivery and postal workers
- nursing staff
- parking attendants
- shop and service sector workers
- transport workers
Diplomatic staff and VIPs are also at risk.
A TUC poll in 2002 showed for the first time workplace violence to be in the top five workplace safety concerns (TUC source).
In addition to workplace violence, lone workers face many hazards made more dangerous because they are alone. Just being ill can be dangerous if there's no-one to help. But particularly:
- electrical and maintenance workers
- farm, forestry and horticultural workers
- lab workers
- sewer and public works staff
face alone all sorts of hazards such as animal attack, chemical accident, electric shock, fire, gas, fall and other physical dangers.
The TUC provides a number of factsheets on the issue, and one of the solutions they suggest is the issuing of staff with some form of panic alarm.
Doing something visible to help your staff is likely to improve morale, help you attract and keep good staff, improve your image, and help you ensure fairness in your workplace, all of which should help you cut costs and improve profits. It's likely to save you money in compensation claims too.
The Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007, which became law in the UK on the 6 April 2008, also means companies and organisations can be found guilty of corporate manslaughter where serious failures in the management of health and safety result in a fatality.
There is a large variety of different systems to help, from under-the-counter pushbuttons to walkie-talkie radios and some care is required to ensure the system is suitable for your needs. Few, if any, provide precise location information about the person who pressed the button (but ours does). One system we've seen, for instance, allows a community nurse to press a panic button, but it's then up to the office staff to check their roster to work out where they 'should' be.
Our solution provides accurate location information down to 4 metres and real time data, so you can watch the location of many employees on one (or more) management screen(s) and you can set up location based alerts. Location information is stored for up to a month forming a long breadcrumb trail.
The source of this location information is a GPS tracking device. We offer two options, BlueRanger and KoolTrax™.
BlueRanger is a small, wearable tracking device that provides real-time location information with GPS accuracy to a central computer. It incorporates a single-button personal, wireless panic alarm and a movement sensor so you can tell if they've stopped moving or removed the tracker.
KoolTrax™ is affordable, downloadable software from Blue Tree Services that can turn a Windows Mobile 5+ device with GPS capability (such as the Mio A701) into a tracking device.
Both devices feed geographic data to our server which can be displayed for you on BlueMap software running on an Internet connected Windows PC.
How does BlueRanger work?
We call the small, credit card sized GPS device that your worker wears, BlueRanger. BlueRanger tells you where your employees are to four metre accuracy, gives them a panic alarm, and tells you if they stop moving.
BlueMap is the software you need to install an Internet connected Windows computer that shows you the location of one or more BlueRanger devices. BlueMap is free with BlueRanger and is licenced for multiple PCs, so you could, for instance, monitor twenty employees across three PCs, potentially in different offices or locations.
Once you've charged your BlueRanger (charger provided) and installed BlueMap, you can enter the names and email and/or mobile phone details of your supervisors and/or managers.
Various alerts may be set up for each BlueRanger:
- panic alarm
- no-movement
- low battery
- in or out of geographic boundary
Each alert type for each BlueRanger raises an on-screen alert on the BlueMap software. In addition, alerts may be delivered by email and/or phone text (SMS).
These alerts may be combined however you wish. For instance, a boundary alarm might be left to alert on screen, no-movement might go by email to a supervisor too, while the panic alarm might trigger text messages to everyone involved. That's all completely configurable by you onscreen and you can change it as often as you like.
Where professional staff are involved the system may be configured to display their location only when there is an alert state. This leaves staff free to manage their time as before without adversely affecting a supportive relationship with management.
Compare GPS trackers
Compare our BlueRanger dedicated GPS tracking device with our KoolTrax™ software that helps you add GPS tracking functionality to your mobile phone or PDA.
We've also included a third column that compares both to an example of our competition: we chose the one that came top in a Google search for a mobile phone location system.
| BlueRanger | KoolTrax™ | Competing mobile location systems* | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Typical accuracy | 4 metres | 4 metres | 400 metres |
| Real-time, continuous location display | √ | √ | x |
| Breadcrumb trail (up to 1 month) | √ | √ | x |
| Geofence alerts | √ | √ | x |
| No-movement, man-down alerts | √ | x | x |
| Panic alarm | Easy button | Software button | x |
| Low battery alert | √ | x | x |
| Alert methods | On screen, email, SMS text to mobile | On screen, email, SMS text to mobile | x |
| Number of people on alert list | practically unlimited | practically unlimited | x |
| 24 hour duty officer (to help in an emergency) | √ | x | x |
| Out of signal behaviour | Breadcrumb trail shows last position, time and direction | Breadcrumb trail shows last position, time and direction | "Can't find" or location of last call or text sent, depending on carrier |
| Discrete | About the size of a pack of cards, wearable | Invisible: in phone/PDA | Invisible: in phone/PDA |
| Can you pass it around? | √ | You won't want to | You won't want to |
| Availability | 10 days by post | immediate download, then approval | immediate download, then password sent by post |
| Price to buy | £299 + £10 p&p, includes data for a year | £39.95 | £176.19 |
| Ongoing costs | £60pa data charge year 2 onwards | Location data is sent using your phone service and charged by your provider | 40p per location request (volume discount down to 8p)** |
| SMS alert costs, eg. boundary | 50 free per month, 25p each thereafter | 10p each, buy topups in £10 blocks | n/a |
| International operation | Yes, but contact us beforehand as we have to enable roaming on your unit (and there are small additional charges) | Yes, just set up roaming with your provider | No, the person you want to track must be in the UK (or in whichever country you set up the service) |
| Requirements | Internet connected Windows PC | Windows Mobile 5+ mobile phone/PDA with GPS, Internet connected Windows PC | Any mobile phone |
*top provider at 11 October 2007
**Compared to our £60 annual data charge, a competing mobile location service for 1 location request every day for a year would cost between £146 and £73 depending whether you purchased your credits as you went along or up front for the year (£100 for 500 text credits). 2 location requests every day would cost between £292 and £116.80 (£200 for 1,260 text credits).
The Blue Tree difference: the problem with mobile phone tracking systems
Our product is very much ahead of the market, and if you are to be safe it's crucial to understand what you are buying. If you've looked around you will have seen mobile tracking devices which locate a mobile phone. You can use that method to locate a BlueRanger too.
But there are two huge problems with mobile phone tracking systems. You have to send a text (perhaps 20p a time) to request the position of the unit. If the target phone is out of signal area, which can happen frequently, what you receive back is either a message to say the phone can't be found, or the approximate location where the phone was last used to make a call or send a text. With Blue Tree Services information is provided real-time not on request. This forms a breadcrumb trail on your screen. If the person happens to go out of reach of a signal, at least you can see where the signal was dropped, when, and which direction they were headed, and as soon as our tracker picks up a signal again, their new location is displayed.
Secondly, what you get back from a mobile phone tracking system almost always gives you a large area to search. A real example of this: "George is within 400 metres of Kings Cross Railway Station". An average car is 4 metres long, so next time you are out and you see a line of parked cars, count a hundred of them. Then think of that as a radius, so think how difficult it would be to find George if he could be 100 cars away in any direction, in any of the buildings. Then imagine you're in a busy shopping centre, airport, or railway station .. exactly the sort of place when you might lose George. When you need to find someone, texting every five minutes and waiting for a text response containing that sort of information isn't very helpful.
The service level of text messaging is also an issue. If you try to send a Happy New Year text at midnight on new year's eve, it's likely to arrive sometime the next afternoon. There is no guarantee that a text message will be sent or responded to in a timely manner.
With BlueRanger, if SMS alerts don't reach you, you will still be able to track position using BlueMap in real-time with normal accuracy of within 4 metres, and you'll also see direction and speed of travel.
Emergency operation
There are two main emergency situations: when the employee presses the alert button, and when the BlueRanger exceeds a boundary (although you might also define no-movement as an emergency too).
In response, you can monitor the location of the BlueRanger unit onscreen and perhaps direct someone on the ground, verbally, using a mobile phone.
If you need to be on the ground yourself or if you have any problems using the software, our emergency operator is here to help. They can see the location of your employees. Call them and they will talk you through the process. When you sign up, you'll receive a dedicated emergency phone number that's operational all day every day.
If you wish, you might also like to purchase a BlueMap PDA which would allow you to walk or drive yourself to find an employee using a hand-held unit that displays where you are in relation to each other (although to stay within the law while driving you probably would have to park each time before using the BlueMap PDA this way, but you can get yourself close, park, and continue on foot). More on that later.
Our trackers must have a connection to the mobile network in order for any alert method to work. We currently use Orange to provide mobile services, their coverage map is here. The system is designed as a person location device so it's assumed that you will rarely be out of a mobile signal area.
If your staff do work in remote locations then a normal mobile phone wouldn't work. The advantage of our system is twofold:
- it provides location data as soon as a connection is established, so there's no watching for a momentary icon on your phone and then being unable to connect for long enough to say what's wrong, and
- it provides a breadcrumb trail so you know when and where the person entered the poor signal area, which direction they were heading, at what speed, and that they haven't come back out again.
Even in poor weather and bad visibility conditions, our trackers give you an exact GPS position you can provide to emergency services.
How it really works
BlueRanger is a GPS device (and KoolTrax™ requires your mobile phone to have GPS). That means it uses radio signals from military satellites to discover its position anywhere on earth to within 4 metres. Your in-car SatNav system does the same thing.
BlueRanger is also connected to the mobile phone network. Assuming your tracking device can get a phone signal, it transmits its location (and if it's a BlueRanger, along with some other exciting data such as whether it's being worn) to our server.
The BlueMap software on your computer talks over the Internet to our server to get the position of your GPS tracking unit, and then it displays where your person is onscreen for you. We currently use Google Maps (but reserve the right to change that without notice), so you can see the location as a road map, as an archive satellite image, or both.
If you are not familiar with Google Maps, enter your postcode here. By default you see the map view, but there's a button for 'satellite', and 'hybrid'. Some areas have stunning high quality satellite images, some only lower quality, but we think Google will bring high quality to all as soon as it is able.
Just to be clear, these are NOT 'live' satellite images, you will not be able to actually see your client, child, parent or employee walking down the street using this system. These are archive satellite images taken weeks, months or years ago.
We take Google Maps and overlay our symbols to show the location of your GPS tracking units. If you have more BlueRanger or KoolTrax™ units, it can display the location of all of them.
BlueRanger uses the very latest SiRFstar III GPS chip and the best active GPS aerial, so you get the most accurate position data, and much improved positional fixes when the BlueRanger is indoors.
What about signal strength and reliability?
GPS devices need to be able to sense the satellites that allow them to discover their position. Traditionally this is more difficult inside a large building or very built-up area, however our use of the best GPS components in BlueRanger minimises this.
We show our confidence in a position using a circle. The larger the circle, the lower our confidence, the larger the area to search. This is very rarely more than a few metres.
In the rare event that BlueRanger cannot calculate its position, or cannot transmit it through the mobile phone network, you still have a breadcrumb trail on screen which shows last position and direction of travel. BlueRanger is connected live to our server, so as soon as the signal is picked up again, your BlueMap software displays it. In this, unusual, situation, what you do know is that the person entered a particular building or poor signal area and hasn't come out. This is in contrast to competing products where you pay to send a text message that would return a "can't find them" message, leaving you to pay to re-send repeatedly.
Our server has an uptime of 99.99%. Occasional essential maintenance is undertaken at the quietest times.
BlueRanger has intelligent power management, so it reduces the number of times it calculates and sends its position as it runs low on power. We ran one down over two weeks and it continued to work, but was only able to send position data every hour. You can see the unit's power status on your BlueMap display, and there is a low battery alert.
How much does a BlueRanger cost?
We have worked hard to provide a service that enables you to budget for the costs involved.
You can buy a BlueRanger unit for £299.00 including normal data for a year (plus £10.00 postage and packing). BlueRanger transmits its location data over a mobile phone link, so in the second and subsequent years there is an annual service charge of £60.
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In unusual circumstances you may incur some additional charges.
- BlueRanger is not, by default, set up to work outside the UK or Ireland. If you wish to use it, for instance, on holiday, you would need to call us and agree to pay the roaming charges set by the mobile phone company (plus 10% to cover administration), just as you would in order to use your mobile phone abroad.
- If you set up lots of SMS alerts, and alert states keep occurring, you might pass our limit of 50 SMS alerts per month. We will then charge 25p per additional SMS alert. We will try to let you know before that happens, but it's simply a matter of you managing your alerts well. No-one has yet passed this limit nor incurred any charges, it's really there to limit our liability if someone does set things up that way.
- If you need technical support, calling our technical helpline is chargeable at 75p per minute.
You may wish to purchase just one BlueRanger to begin with, and pass it around according to the day's plan. We simply track the BlueRanger unit.
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Does it work outside the UK and Ireland?
BlueRanger is sold in the UK and Ireland set up to work in your country, but it does work in other countries, you simply have to let us know beforehand, and agree to pay the roaming charges from the mobile phone company (plus 10% to cover administration).
How much does KoolTrax™ cost?
KoolTrax™ is a very affordable, downloadable GPS tracking solution for mobile devices (phones and PDAs) using Windows Mobile 5+ and with GPS capability.
You can download KoolTrax™ for £39.95.
If you want to use KoolTrax™ with geographic boundaries, you can receive alerts onscreen and by email free of charge. Alerts sent by SMS mobile text, however, require you to create a credit balance with Blue Tree Services. They are charged at 10p each and may be bought in £10 blocks.
In normal operation KoolTrax™ sends its location information over your mobile's data connection. You would pay your supplier for that under your existing tarif. The amount of data sent is small, but it might be worth checking you still have the best tarif for your needs. You can switch KoolTrax™ off whenever you don't want to be tracked.
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How can I cancel?
If you change your mind and wish to cancel a new order, you have a statutory seven days to do so. You must let us know in writing or by email and return the product unopened, uninstalled and at your expense.
For data, 12 months is the minimum term. There is no obligation to continue to purchase data services, but the unit won't be useful without it.
Guarantee
We want you to be completely satisfied with purchase, and we are absolutely sure you will be. You're going to love what we offer, so we want to make sure you get the chance to see what we mean, and feel the product working for you. So we offer an iron clad, no-quibble, fourteen day money back guarantee.
So that's that: if, after fourteen days of use, you're not absolutely happy with the BlueMap software on your PC or with your chosen tracking unit or with anything at all that we've provided for whatever reason, just return it to us in its original condition, and we'll refund your money in full. No questions asked. No hard feelings. No problem.
What you will get when you order BlueRanger
| BlueRanger | |
|---|---|
| A wearable BlueRanger unit | √ |
| A wall charger (the unit has integral batteries) | √ |
| A user manual | √ |
| A BlueMap management software CD | √ |
| Access to our technical support line (business hours only) | √ |
| History/breadcrumb trail capability | √ |
| Panic alert button | enabled |
| Knock alert facility (being worn/fall alarm) | √ |
| Boundary inside alert capability | √ |
| Boundary outside alert capability | √ |
| Multiple BlueMap logins | √ |
| Multiple contacts for alerts | √ |
| Multiple groups for alerts | √ |
| Access to our 24 hour emergency line | √ |
| International roaming | on request |
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What you need: system requirements
In order to use BlueMap software to manage the service and track the position of the person wearing your BlueRanger unit, you will need an Internet connected Windows PC.
What you need for KoolTrax™
In order to use KoolTrax™ software to turn your mobile phone or PDA into a personal GPS tracker, your phone needs to be running Windows Mobile 5+ and have NMEA compliant GPS capability.
If you don't know whether your phone is running Windows Mobile 5+, there's a screenshot on Wikipedia which shows you what it looks like.
KoolTrax™ also requires a device with GPS capability.
If your phone or PDA is incompatible but you want KoolTrax™, here are some options.
If your phone or PDA isn't Windows Mobile 5+, then you might consider taking the opportunity to get a new phone. If you're doing that, aim for a phone that has inbuilt GPS such as the Mio A701 available through Amazon
Alternatively if your phone or PDA supports Java, a Java version of KoolTrax™ is under development, so you might prefer to wait for that. Sign up to receive notification when KoolTrax™ Java is launched.
The most common phone operating system is Symbian. If you have a Nokia, Ericsson, Sony Ericsson, Panasonic, Siemens AG, Samsung or BenQ phone it's likely it's running Symbian rather than Windows Mobile 5. We are developing a Symbian version too. Sign up to receive notification when KoolTrax™ Symbian is launched.
If you have a Windows Mobile 5+ phone that isn't GPS enabled, you can buy GPS devices that connect to your phone using BlueTooth, for instance those provided by Garmin or the Holux GPSlim236 Wireless Bluetooth GPS Receiver, again available through Amazon
In addition, to manage the service and display the position of one or more KoolTrax™ user, you will need an Internet connected Windows PC.
Track your BlueRanger while you are mobile too, using the BlueMap PDA
The BlueMap PDA is an optional fully featured Personal Digital Assistant running BlueMap software, so you can see onscreen the relative positions of you and the person wearing a Blue Tree Services tracker together with the direction of travel. To find them, you just travel or walk towards them. We haven't seen this capability anywhere else.
It's also a fully functioning PDA. We are currently using the Mio A701, so it gives you satnav, it's a phone, camera, video and audio player, and comes with Microsoft Office mobile, a calendar, contacts list and much more. So now you have a great reason to get a gorgeous, state of the art PDA.
BlueRanger works well without the BlueMap PDA, but with it, finding an errant runaway is fast and easy, and if, during a search, you still have someone watching BlueMap on your home computer, they can see the relative positions of both units.
Our price for the BlueMap PDA is £351.33 + £10.00 per order for p&p. You have a choice regarding the data charges. You may buy a BlueMap PDA and put your own phone sim into it, so you keep your number and contacts and you pay for the data charges through your existing phone contract. Or you can buy a new sim from us at £141 per year.
All BlueMap (parent or manager) units are able to track more than one BlueRanger (child or client) unit at no additional cost.
What you are getting
Our service provides
- the ability to track the real position of anyone (assuming they accept being tracked)
- 4 metre positional accuracy
- real-time, live location data
- a breadcrumb trail of where they have been
- the security of knowing you or your child, parent, client or staff member has an alert button that, when pressed, shows you exactly where they are
- control of the setup of any number of geofence boundaries of any shape, that you can switch between at will
- the ability to set up alerts by email and/or text message to any number of people
In addition BlueRanger gives you
- emergency telephone assistance
- the ability to set up a "not being worn" alarm
- the first fifty SMS alerts free each month
How to order
Improve the safety of your workforce. BlueRanger and KoolTrax are in stock now.
Still not sure which is right for you? Check the comparison chart above. Otherwise, click to purchase through our secure shopping partner:
BlueRanger
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KoolTrax™
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What happens after I've bought?
Software products are immediately downloadable along with instructions for installation. You will require an activation code from us which is dispatched by humans so please allow a business day.
For physical products, we currently try to ship every Tuesday by Parcel Post, so if you order by mid-day on a Tuesday you are likely to receive it next day. If you order on a Wednesday it will be just over a week.
When you receive your parcel, if you have BlueRangers, set them charging.
You will be asked to agree to our terms and conditions and to request the unit be activated. Privacy laws require this step.
Once you've done that, we send you a login code. You install BlueMap software on your PC, enter the login, turn on the BlueRanger and you will see its position on your screen. Well done, you're tracking!
Set up boundaries using BlueMap software by drawing them on an on-screen map, and enter the details of who is to receive alerts, under what circumstances, and by which method (email/SMS).
Next step: Put BlueRanger in place and ensure your staff are safe.
Improve morale, save staff turnover and recruitment costs, cut legislation claims. Do the right thing. Click here