SMS alerts save lives

Thirty-nine people were killed when severe tornadoes swept through ten US states in early March but, according to reports, the death toll would have been a great deal higher if a complete early warning package - including SMS text alerts - had not been in place.

“Everyone knew that this tornado was coming and that it would be on the ground a long time,” tornado victim Roger Jones, 60, from Kentucky, told USA Today. “They were absolutely right on."

Local authorities and public sector bodies have been using text messaging as part of their emergency alert systems for some time now.

In the US, many local counties broadcast tornado text alerts to subscribers as soon as the National Weather Service issues a tornado warning. The same systems are used to disseminate other emergency messages relating to the health, safety or welfare of local communities.

In Australia, federal governments use SMS alerts to broadcast bushfire, flood and even tsunami warnings to the public, while in Canada text alerts are part of the Ontario government's Emergency Public Warning System. This sends 'Red Alerts' to subscribers when a serious incident has occurred, such as a large fire or explosion; chemical leak or spill; nuclear emergency or extreme weather event.

Similar systems are in operation in the UK, but our public sector agencies are also finding more mundane, but practical uses for bulk SMS messaging. Examples include:

• Advising of changes to refuse collection during holidays or bad weather
• Warning of the unexpected closure of community facilities, such as libraries or leisure centres
• Hospital appointment reminders
• Court appearance reminders to witnesses
• Missing dog alerts to dog walkers
• Rental balance reminders for tenants

HSL supports a range of clients who use text messaging to communicate emergency alerts. For example, Newmont Mining Corporation in Indonesia, one of the world’s largest gold producers helps to protect its workforce of 7000 people and neighbouring communities through a Tsunami and tropical cyclone text alert warning system delivered by HSL. More information on how this works can be found at http://www.hslsms.com/about/clients/case-study-newmont/.

Dartmoor Search and Rescue Service has worked with HSL for the last five years using text messaging for emergency call outs for their team. This is also used as a two way communication system, as team members can confirm their attendance with a text reply. You can read about how Dartmoor’s Search and Rescue team works with HSL to protect visitors who get into difficulty here: http://hslsms.com/about/clients/case-study-dartmoor-search-and-rescue/.

You will find information on our mobile messaging solutions for the public sector on our website at http://www.hslsms.com/sectors/public-sector/.

Alternatively, visit us at:

http://www.linkedin.com/company/hay-systems-ltd

follow us on Twitter @HSLSMS

or call us on +44 (0)1506 605260

or email us at sales@haysystems.com

Business continuity: communicating with staff via text

Is your business prepared for disaster?

Perhaps you run a transport firm, and heavy snow is disrupting some routes. Maybe you are a city office manager, trying to contact staff during a terrorist alert. Or maybe you are in charge of operations at a large legal firm, trying to get things moving after a fire at your head office.

Whatever your business, you will find it difficult to function in a crisis situation if you have not planned your responses in advance.

Business continuity plans are an increasingly important part of running an organisation: in fact new research from the British Insurance Brokers’ Association and the Cabinet Office has revealed that having such a plan is likely to stop businesses failing after a major disruption such as a flood or fire.

Business continuity plans require firms to think through all the issues that could affect them, and to put in place systems and procedures to resolve any difficulties. Key areas to consider include:

· premises;

· equipment and machinery;

· people;

· transport; and

· communication

Communication is clearly a major issue in the three scenarios mentioned earlier. In each case those in charge need to contact a large number of people in a short space of time, providing warnings, information and instructions.

Text alerts are the obvious solution, as they allow messages to be sent instantly - and en masse - to individuals and groups of people around the country.

SMS messaging also has the advantage of being cost effective and, because it doesn't transmit over voice channels, will work at times of crisis - when the phone lines and mobile voice networks are likely to be jammed.

For more information on mobile messaging solutions visit us at:

http://www.linkedin.com/company/hay-systems-ltd

follow us on Twitter @HSLSMS

or call us on +44 (0)1506 605 260

or email us at sales@haysystems.com

Winter weather warnings - and advice Feb 2012

The UK's mild winter came to an abrupt end last week as temperatures dropped and parts of the UK came to a standstill due to the snow. Hundreds of flights have been cancelled, trains have been delayed and sections of motorway have been completely closed.

Elsewhere in Europe, temperatures as low as -32.5°C have been reported in Romania, while Moscow suffered a low of -21°C. Worst hit appears to be Serbia where, according to The Guardian, around 11,000 people have been stranded in remote mountain villages, cut off by the heavy snow.

Luckily, the UK is unlikely to face conditions as severe as this but, with the AA warning that more than one in three drivers (38%) have done nothing to prepare for winter, even a short spell of wintry weather causes chaos on the roads - and at work.

Preparation is the key. The AA recommends winter tyres, packing the car with essentials such as a shovel and warm blankets, and making plans to avoid driving when bad weather hits.

We recommend advance planning too; keeping your staff safe and off the roads by informing them of office closures before they set off. Mobile messaging is the perfect way to do this. Most people carry a mobile phone with them, so contacting them by text is an easy and cost effective way to keep in touch with large groups of employees and indeed customers.

An extreme but practical example of SMS alerts in action can be seen in Indonesia, where Newmont Mining Corporation uses our emergency messaging system to trigger tsunami warnings. The mobile messages set off sirens, which alert miners and the surrounding communities to the possible danger. The system is also used to send text messages to employees, with more detailed information.

According to Peter Ferringo, Senior Manager Operations Support at the mine, "the technology helps the warnings to be more immediate and effective in alerting our communities and staff in case of an emergency."

For more information how mobile messaging solutions can help your business in severe weather visit us at: http://www.linkedin.com/company/hay-systems-ltd

follow us on Twitter @HSLSMS
or call us on +44 (0)1506 605 260

or email us at sales@haysystems.com

A Summary of HSL's Top Winter Communication Tips

We hope you’ve enjoyed our blog series this week, and that we’ve helped you understand both what needs to be done to prepare for adverse weather this winter and how to go about doing it.  Here is a summary of the key points:

• Plan ahead
• Communicate quickly and effectively
• Be flexible
• Remember health & safety
• Be aware of the legal situation
• Think about remote working
• Keep in touch
• Review, revise and implement

And

• Contact HSL for a low-cost effective mobile messaging solution

We’ve been growing HSL for 12 years, working with high profile customers such as BAA, DHL, Sony Ericsson, the Police and government organisations, but we also enjoy working with smaller companies too.

We have a global coverage of more than 630 mobile networks, within more than 200 countries. It’s built on a robust technical infrastructure that allows us to provide a guarantee of at least 99.9% network availability to our customers.

So we know that we do a great job providing low-cost, effective mobile messaging solutions and we’d like to work with you. Please get in touch soon to ensure your business is prepared for the worst this winter will bring.

Thank you for reading our blogs – we’d like to leave you with a smile on your face, so please enjoy this funny video clip.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3hbd0nnr3E

visit us at:
http://www.linkedin.com/company/hay-systems-ltd

follow us on Twitter @HSLSMS
or call us on +44 (0)1506 605 260

or email us at sales@haysystems.com

How to incorporate SMS text messaging as part of your crisis communications

So far this week we’ve shared our best advice with you; it’s best practice gathered from working with our clients across a broad spectrum of sectors – and countries – and we know it works.

Now we want to explain how HSL can help you and your business.

If bad weather conditions or public transport make it difficult or dangerous for employees to get to work, you need to communicate quickly with them to ensure that they do not travel to work unnecessarily and work from home when possible.  The most immediate and effective way to do that is sending a text message and that’s where we come in.

SMS messaging is not only a simple solution – we set up the whole process for you – it’s an incredibly cost-effective one.

And it’s important to remember as well that text messaging is much more mainstream than other forms of communication like social media or even email and it’s quicker and easier to manage than a hasty round robin telephone call.

There’s a perceived immediacy with a text message compared to other forms of communication; you’ve seen it, people regularly stop what they’re doing to read a text, and while ownership of smart phones is growing exponentially, only 28% of adults in the UK are using their phone to access emails.

We send millions of messages a month on behalf of customers, not just in the UK but around the world – 85% of our customers are in Europe, 9% in the Middle East, Asia and Africa, and 6% in the USA and Canada.

Our customers use messaging in a variety of ways, from routine communications updates to messaging in emergency situations, such as issuing early warning alerts for Tsunamis and search and rescue alerts.

We’d like to share a case study with you to show how it works; Dartmoor Search & Rescue Team has been working with HSL for five years.  They have used SMS messaging to replace their paging call out system.  Given the nature of the organisation and the service it provides, it was vital that they ensured a reliable service.

In an emergency situation, the rescue group is called out by the Police when there is reason to believe that one or more people may be missing or injured on Dartmoor. An SMS message is then sent to a broadcast number, which automates a call-out message to be sent to team members, who can then send a confirmation of attendance text to the broadcaster. The SMS technology also provides Dartmoor Search and Rescue Group with a means of communicating with their members on a regular basis.

To this day this emergency team continues to utilise HSL's AlertBroadcast solution, as over the years HSL's solution has remained a reliable and effective messaging system for their teams.

Paul Hudson, Controller for Dartmoor Search & Rescue Group says, "The system has been proven to be extremely reliable on callouts since we began its use 5 years ago!"

Based on our emergency experience, we think there is big opportunity to use text messaging as a rapid, efficient and low cost way to communicate to help avoid some of the travel chaos during severe weather and we’d like to help you.

visit us at:
http://www.linkedin.com/company/hay-systems-ltd

follow us on Twitter @HSLSMS
or call us on +44 (0)1506 605 260

or email us at sales@haysystems.com

Snow chaos and your legal rights, and remote working

Experts estimate that around 2000 businesses were at risk of failure due to the bad weather last winter. In a tough economic climate it doesn’t take much to push a business to the edge, and the treacherous snow and ice conditions only served to push even closer to disaster.

But it doesn’t have to be like that.

With the Met Office forecasting a similarly difficult winter, it’s important to start planning now; companies that plan for adverse weather conditions, communicate well – and in a timely fashion - with their employees, and put plans in place to allow staff to work from home can minimise the potential impact on their business.

Did you know, it’s a fact that home workers are often more efficient than office-based workers?  And in a crisis situation an employee working from home is certainly more efficient than an employee stuck in a snowbound traffic jam for most of the morning, unable to fulfil their customer commitments, who then spends the rest of the day discussing their nightmare journey and planning an early finish to get home before the weather deteriorates even further.

Employers have a legal duty of care to ensure their employees are not placed at unnecessary risk while working, and when police and weather forecasters warn people not to travel, employers should be making sure their employees know they have permission to stay at home, and are properly equipped to do their job from there.

You should be aware of how the law affects you and your employees in a situation where the weather conditions are severe and it’s deemed dangerous to travel by experts. Read up on guidance on employment policies to make sure you know what’s reasonable to expect of your staff and what’s not. And make sure your own policies reflect both the law, and your own values about care of your employees. A good policy should cover issues including entitlement to time off, entitlement to paid or unpaid leave, working from home and flexible working hours to avoid dangerous or rush hour traffic and travel.

And bearing in mind the fact about home workers and efficiency, you should also be thinking about technology outside the office, equipment, communications and remote connectivity that will make it possible for employees to work from home. It’s a good idea to ensure staff have laptops and internet connections at home (where necessary) and that they have the passwords – and of course, the knowledge – to safely and securely access servers at work.

Finally, don’t forget to keep in touch. Just because you’ve advised employees to stay at home doesn’t mean your job’s done. Communicating with staff throughout the course of the bad weather not only shows you care, but ensures everyone feels involved and part of the team. SMS text messages allow you to personalise messages to individual staff or send an immediate message to all staff at the same time. You can keep them updated on the weather situation or communicate about individual work requirements.

Remember, text messaging has the highest open and read rates over email and other forms of communication. A recent study found that text messaging opening rates were above 92% - and of these messages, 65% were read within five minutes and 85% within an hour.

And it’s cheap too – for just a few pence each, it’s possible to send bulk texts to your employees and keep your business alive and thriving whatever the weather.

Tomorrow – how to incorporate SMS text messaging as part of your crisis communications

visit us at:
http://www.linkedin.com/company/hay-systems-ltd

follow us on Twitter @HSLSMS
or call us on +44 (0)1506 605 260

or email us at sales@haysystems.com

Planning, flexibility and health and safety

We know from working closely with our clients just how important it is to be able to react quickly to changing circumstances, and to be able to communicate what needs to happen both reliably and cost effectively.

So we have put together our top tips for preparing to deal with adverse weather conditions, starting with planning ahead.

It sounds simple, but make sure you have an adverse weather policy that describes clearly and in detail the various steps the company and employees should take in severe weather conditions.

If you don’t have such a policy, think back to how you coped last winter, how effective were you, what was the impact on your business and your employees, and what could you have done better. These are the building blocks for your new policy.

You need to have up to date contact details for employees, customers, suppliers and other important business contacts, and this information needs to be accessible in a crisis, from wherever you might be at the time. It’s a good idea to save these in multiple locations and/or in the cloud. And make sure you have multiple ways of contacting all these people; you need home and mobile phone numbers as well as email addresses. You’ll also need this for SMS texting.

Think about who should be responsible for communicating in a severe weather crisis, and clearly define that role, making sure those involved understand their responsibilities and are happy to fulfil them. And it’s a good idea to share the roles and responsibilities between a group of people to ensure absence cover for sickness or holidays.

Ideally, practice your plan before you have to implement it in a real situation, you can learn from any mistakes or gaps in the plan and refine to make sure it’s really effective.

And once you’ve had a chance to test your plan in a live situation, review again, amending to incorporate any changes that might be necessary – you never know when you might need to use it again.

If the forecast for this winter is accurate, you could be implementing the plan sooner rather than later.

visit us at:

http://www.linkedin.com/company/hay-systems-ltd

follow us on Twitter @HSLSMS

or call us on +44 (0)1506 605 260

or email us at sales@haysystems.com

Tomorrow – snow chaos and your legal rights, and remote working.