Guarding

Smart forms for South Kensington

by Mark Rowe

The guarding contractor Wilson James has appointed SmartTask as preferred technology partner and awarded it a deal for the supply of a mobile patrol and electronic ‘smart forms’ software. It’ll be in use for a new security contract with National Museums. Wilson James will now roll out the SmartTask workforce management software to ten sites including the Natural History Museum, V&A (pictured) and Science & Industry Museum in South Kensington. This follows a trial that achieved significant time savings by removing paperwork and streamlining operational processes.

This partnership will replace an incumbent supplier agreement that no longer met business and operational requirements, the security and logistics services contractor said. In particular, the retender process for the security contract with National Museums required a single provider of a mobile patrol and electronic smart form solution.

An initial trial at the Natural History Museum focused on use of electronic forms via SmartTask-enabled smartphones to reduce admin, and raise productivity of operational staff. It was designed to identify potential benefits based on the precise requirements of the customer as well as create a suite of seven SmartForms and reports that could deliver standardised data capture and analysis. This included confiscated items and vehicle check ‘SmartForms’, scenario testing and incident reporting.

The trial highlighted the benefits of using the SmartForms, most notably around confiscated items and vehicle forms. Confiscated items, from bag searches carried out at point of entry, historically required ten to 15 minutes to handle; meanwhile the security officer was away from the floor. With the adoption of SmartTask, reports can now be created automatically, reducing paper usage and printing.

The time savings achieved at the Natural History Museum have led to greater capacity to carry out bag searches and more visible security staff. Management time has also been saved in production of required monthly reports, as well as administration savings of 12 hours per week for security duty managers.

Don McCann, Technology Systems Consultant at Wilson James said: “SmartTask provided significant support throughout the contract bid and contributed to the successful re-signing for a further five years. The solution is now fully operational at five locations – Natural History Museum, National Science & Media Museum, National Railway Museum, Science & Industry Museum and a Wandsworth storage site – with the Science Museum and V&A to follow shortly. SmartTask has also handled a separate project for Bradford Science Festival, which further demonstrated the flexibility of the system, ease of deployment and its suitability for the security sector.”

Paul Ridden, CEO of SmartTask said: “This latest agreement demonstrates our ability to work closely with our customers to develop advanced workforce management solutions that support business development, customer retention and quality service delivery. We are now partner of choice for a growing number of security organisations based on our proven track record helping to tackle some of the most common and difficult operational challenges they face.”

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