In today’s environment, and the situation that we are currently in, businesses and organisations will still be left with questions – most of which will be answered on the go as they learn more about what impact this pandemic will have on operations. As our situation continues to evolve, and its looking likely that the initial lockdown may be extended, many business this week will be taking steps to further protect their people and property alike. Initially businesses may have stayed operational but are finding that temporary closures, and therefore temporary security measures are necessary.
Here are a few simple steps you can take if you’re the one responsible for ensuring your business is secure:
- Test your alarm systems with your monitoring company
This could easily be overlooked but should be a priority. If your alarm is monitored, you want to know that if your alarm is sounding for whatever reason – you will be informed.
- Update your keyholder contact list
This may also be overlooked especially when you are faced with so many changes, so quickly. If an event occurs, your monitoring centre will need to know who is available to respond and make key decisions.
- Check your cameras
Are you getting full coverage? Are the cameras you have installed focused correctly? Are they showing online and properly connected to your video management software (VMS) or network video recorder (NVR)?
- Check your NVR
You may need to adjust your recording options. Storage times may need to be extended, say if you are currently only storing 7 days’ worth of footage this could be extended to 14 or 30 days. If you would like to view your cameras remotely, can this be done via an app? If you are wondering how to do this, now is the time to contact Paramount Group and we can assist.
- Restrict employee access
Businesses small and large are being encouraged to enforce social distancing by ensuring workers work remotely. Smaller businesses may find this easier to control and manage. If you are responsible for a larger organisation and tasked with keeping multiple sites closed from a large number of employees, this could be achieved by restricting access via your access control system. Similarly if you are tasked with keeping the buildings operational, you can restrict employee movements to try and encourage social distancing. If this is something that you think could be achieved with the system you have installed, be sure to inform employees of the changes prior to this being rolled out. If you would like assistance or any advice on access control Paramount can assist.
If you would like any advice or would like to chat about what else Paramount could offer, please get in touch. All of our office staff are working remotely and have access to Zoom if you would prefer a video chat.