Duty of Care and Sign Of Life

Ensuring that your staff are safe while travelling is an integral part of your duty of care responsibilities. In addition to travel tracking you should also have a sign of life system that ensures that your employees are safe. The main types of sign of life services are Check Calls and Check Ins.

Check Call

Check call is where an employee calls a security number or operations center at set times on set days to confirm that they are OK. When a traveler fails to make a check call a process is initiated according to the company's standard operating procedures. This may involve something as simple as trying to contact the traveler to a full scale search and rescue operation.

With standard check calls the traveler has to arrange the check calls with the appropriate persons or service, add the check calls to their diaries and finally make the check calls at the right times. This opens up numerous opportunities for mistakes to be made. Automated check calls allow the travelers to have their check calls automatically created based on travel itineraries, and automatic reminders to be sent to the travelers. This makes the process easier for travelers, reduces the number of failed check calls and reduces costs for the company.

Check Ins

Check in is the process where a traveler confirms that he or she is OK through a feature phone, smartphone or computer rather than through a call to a duty phone or operations center. Unlike check calls, check ins are usually not scheduled with the traveler, but are done on an ad hoc basis.

Standard check-ins give you a less accurate picture of the state of your travelers, but in return is more cost effect and requires less management. Automated and active check-ins are where the check in service contacts the traveler at certain intervals and requests the traveler to confirm their status back. Once the traveler has been sent a request he or she has a certain time to confirm back. Administrators can receive updates when the travelers confirm their status or more often when the traveler has failed to check in.

The screenshot below shows travelers who have failed to make their check in within the specified time period and well as a pending check in for one traveler. The traveler is still within the accepted check in period. When a traveler has failed to check in the tracking platform will automatically notify administrators of the failed check in, allowing them to take appropriate action.

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