Responsible for providing specialist mental health services for the whole of Norfolk and Suffolk, the Trust delivers care and attention to around 14,000 people at any one time. Utilising PageOne’s powerful SmartGroup technology, on-call doctors and nursing teams are assigned to groups based on the emergencies to which they are qualified to respond. When an incident occurs, administrative staff can initiate messages directly from within Flare, PageOne’s dedicated web-based messaging suite. Once a message has been sent to the Responder, the administrative staff at Norfolk and Suffolk can see at a glance whether the message has been delivered and via a number of preset responses, receive acknowledgement of how the message recipient has responded.
“It’s vital that the Trust has the underlying systems and processes in place to enable a fast and effective emergency response,” said Richard Green, ICT Security Manager Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust. “PageOne’s 2-way Responder gives us this flexibility and means our support staff know the exact status of any ongoing incident via the Flare interface. This makes us even more efficient as our team knows which incidents are being dealt with and those they might need to escalate.”

Fully integrated into PageOne’s web-based messaging applications, or existing command and control systems, the 2-way Responder combines the strengths of paging with GSM/GPRS to deliver powerful 2-way messaging capability. With this greater intelligence, administrators can make rapid, informed decisions on the mobilisation and coordination of staff and resources.
Norfolk and Suffolk has even experienced the benefits of the two-way Responder first- hand after a member of its own staff suffered an asthma attack onsite.

“In the incidence of breathing difficulties it’s important to get oxygen to the patient as soon as possible, so I phoned Reception as I felt an asthma attack coming on and just asked if I could get some oxygen to prevent it,” explained Ben Shotbolt, ICT Support Technician, Norfolk and Waveney Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust. “Within two minutes of me calling reception a medical emergency had been declared and a team of nurses and doctors had arrived on-scene – no small feat considering where they were on site. Having been on the receiving end, I really do appreciate what a difference a device such as the Responder can make to our patients.”

“By closing the loop on traditional broadcast messaging our 2-way Responder has enabled Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust to further enhance its operational and incident management processes. The device has proved to be an invaluable communication channel for the Trust providing a quick, secure and reliable mechanism to manage its resources more efficiently” said Clair Cawley, Director of Marketing, PageOne Communications.

Download the full release here

PageOne Connect and Flare accounts have recently been upgraded to v2.2. This latest customer upgrade includes many new features and also provides access to PageOne’s powerful, advanced communication tools.

• New look interface – adjust the screen layout to suit how you work
• Quick View – follow the message history with a conversational layout
• Improved Contact Manager – New and Custom fields to hold information specific to your staff
• Access to advanced services and features*:
• Location enabled messaging
• Voice Messaging, Alerting & Conferencing tools
• Document Storage
• Smart Filters – quickly create bespoke distribution lists based on your search criteria*
• Better Reporting – additional report types and export formats.
• Enhanced Inbox – Easy search & display concatenated messages

Watch the upgrade video tutorial to understand how these new features can be leveraged to improve the way you communicate today.

If your account has not already been updated, then you should be receiving the update shortly. If you have any questions about the features introduced in V2.2 or the free upgrade process, please contact us.

*Advanced services may require an additional subscription.

Dedicated to helping the government wider public sector deliver better public services, more efficiently and effectively, this year’s exhibition and conference is set to provide delegates with the information, instruction, advice and expertise needed to face challenges head on.

Join PageOne at the Public Sector Efficiency Expo, Earls Court Olympia 2 on Tuesday 6th March 2012 to find out how we can help you achieve vital cost saving and improve efficiency.

Join PageOne 29th February 2012 at Strathclyde Fire & Rescue HQ, and discover what we can do to help you beat the challenge of Scottish Transformation.

Click here for more information or to register your interest in the event.

Critical information sent via BlackBerry email can often become lost amongst everyday general messages, meaning staff miss important alerts and do not respond promptly to the sender. With a dedicated inbox, pop-up alerts and 2-way QuickReply options the Blackberry Responder App ensures vital information that needs to be noticed is actioned immediately. Receipt and opening of messages is confirmed and the QuickReply option allows staff to respond with status, action or updates. “With the average employee receiving 100-200 emails per day, its vital to differentiate those that must be immediately acted upon,” said Nigel Gray, Sales Director at PageOne Communications. “Doing so instantly makes your existing communications that much more effective.”

The Blackberry Responder App also offers optional lone worker functions such as an SOS alert and GPS location capability to provide additional support and peace-of-mind for lone field operatives. Pressing and holding the BlackBerry’s SOS alert button triggers an audible and visual distress signal direct to their employers Connect or Flare account, together with a GPS location if available. The SOS alert can also automatically be pushed to an email account, mobile or pager.

As part of their employer duty of care, staff overseeing operatives out in the field can see an audited overview of all remote staff and their status via a customised dashboard. Automated periodic reminder alerts can be set-up that must be acknowledged by the user, without which an SOS alert is auto-generated.

“The more for less mantra rippling through both the public and private sector has had a major impact on, and changed, working practices. We have seen a dramatic increase in the number of employees who should be classified as lone workers for some or all of their role,” added Nigel Gray. “The BlackBerry Responder App offers a cost effective way of meeting this employer duty of care to its employees.”

PageOne’s Blackberry Responder service requires no server/network hardware or software to be installed and seamlessly integrates with PageOne’s Connect and Flare web-based suites. Operational staff can send and receive messages to any combination of BlackBerry, pager mobile and email with an automatically generated audit trail of message delivery, receipt and reply. Using status updates they can also deliver more targeted broadcasts, for example sending only to staff who are ‘available’.

Download the full release here

PageOne’s Campaign Manager makes it possible to create interactive SMS-based Short Code and keyword campaigns in minutes using a simple web console. A secure online account allows users to quickly and easily configure key variables such as the campaign duration, choice of automated response type, and campaign keyword, all manageable in real time.

The Mercedes Benz dealership has embedded PageOne’s service for use within a range of applications that enhance internal communications, improve customer service and enrich marketing activity. In fact, SMS has grown to become an increasingly valuable channel to connect not just with customers, but also with the dealership’s 65-strong aftersales team. Sending out daily text alerts keeps them updated on targets, performance and key information whilst also providing a much needed means to engage with the team.

Having been recommended through referral, dealership manager Ian Straw felt the high volume messaging and robust easy-to-use system was the obvious choice. ‘The service is very intuitive and easy to use. You can literally send out hundreds of text messages in the space of minutes and the great thing is that it has a prompter to guide you through the set-up process. Instead of taking an untargeted approach, you can actually see who is interested and follow these through with a call, which is excellent’.

PageOne’s Campaign Manager provides real-time results. An instant snapshot can be generated with a few button clicks and an extended log of the actual messages sent and received can be viewed online, or exported for historical campaign reporting purposes.

The dealership is also using PageOne’s services for ad hoc marketing campaigns. Straw says, ‘It has allowed us to simply target a key area of our customer base and our success rate has been approximately 50% better than we expect on a mail-out, at a tenth of the cost’.

Campaign Manager is also being used to enhance customer service. Now when ordered parts come in, the customer receives a telephone call and a text message. Straw says, ‘It simply a great way of making sure that the right people, get the right information, at the right time. It generates a record for us, so we know a client has been contacted and also capitalises on the fact that a text message is highly likely to be promptly read.

Campaign messages can be scheduled to coincide with a specific event and sent using a 2-way number so customers can easily respond to messages at their standard network rate. Alternatively, messages can also be sent using an alpha tag or ID sender so the message recipient can quickly recognise who the message is from. Industry standard opt-in and opt-out commands are supported and an additional subscriber list facility allows users to further segment and intelligently build a database of respondents and prospects.

Download the full release here

Responding to emergency incidents is an integral part of the UK Fire and Rescue Service and its role within society is essential to improving the safety of local communities. However, drastic cuts to funding announced in the Spending Review suggest that firefighters are increasingly being asked to do more with less, whilst still providing a quality public service to its citizens.

An independent survey commissioned by PageOne consisting of over 500 professionals within the UK Fire Services, highlighted a number of key trends and areas of concern within the industry. Responses to non-fire issues, particularly natural disasters including flooding and environmental pollution were seen as surging threats which would be certain to expand the remits of their role. However, an astounding two thirds of individuals surveyed cited a reduction in manpower to be the biggest area of concern, and a further fifth expected to see station closures occur in a bid to achieve substantial savings. With the expectation of considerable cuts to manpower and government funding as a whole, over 86% of respondents believed investment in technology would be a priority over the coming months.

In response to these concerns, PageOne has been working closely with a number of Fire and Rescue services to provide functional technology that can help manage both assets and resources more efficiently. The fundamental premise being to provide, a more detailed understanding of where staff are and their availability. The power of such information can provide a wealth of benefits including improved response times by mobilising personnel closest to the desired location and with the appropriate skill set to deal with the challenges of the scene. Better co-ordination of information between the Command and Control centres, firefighters out in the field and key stakeholders has also proven to be a an important area in achieving an effective response.

Essex fire is one service that is truly benefitting from integrating technology with their command and control centre and who rely on this to get the right people to the right place at the right time. They depend on paging (and critical messaging services) to ensure that 280 key operational and support workers such as fire officers, administrators and specialist teams are easily contactable from the command and control room. Essex has integrated its paging solution with its own control system to facilitate the process of sending out various specialist groups to incidents across the country. This has led to a much more joined-up emergency response and enables Essex fire fighters to immediately dispatch volunteers, for example from The British Red Cross fire victims support service, who can help with issues such as arranging alternative accommodation for those affected by a disaster.

Ultimately, the effectiveness of any emergency response can be broken down into three factors; the ability to receive, respond and act on timely information. In fact, 70% of respondents surveyed, stated that increased efficiency and faster response times were some of the key benefits sought when adopting new technology. Traditionally paging technology has been a key enabler for communications within the Fire Service, providing an unrivalled mechanism to receive information. The inherent benefits of paging, its successful use in critical environments, can now be combined with 2-way communication that if used correctly will significantly improve fire response times. Two-way paging provides reliable 2-way communication with the usual speed, assurance and reach of paging, only now with the additional capability to acknowledge and respond to a paging broadcast, thus very effectively closing the communications loop. The technology can also support enhanced features including an emergency SOS button and GPS-based location tracking, so the incident manager can target messaging based on locality as well as availability. In comparison with SMS, 2-way paging delivers more information, but the real benefits to this is that the information can be logged at the command and control centre, providing a full audit trail of messaging events for review at a later date.

Firefighters out in the field can use 2-way paging to update the control room of their operational status. The individual selects status updates such as – ‘mobile’, at ‘scene’, ‘clear of scene’, ‘available for deployment’, for example – and sends this information back to the control room. Simple changes to technology such as this will have significant impact on resource management and enable better targeting of information to operational personnel.

The introduction of the reply path for paging has also been extended in the Responder to group calling or broadcast messaging, so in the immediate aftermath of unforeseen events such as fires, floods and terrorism, there may be a large number of groups that need to be contacted instantly and kept informed using the one-to-many broadcast ability of paging. This one to many group call is now further enhanced by allowing all those individuals to auto-confirm receipt of the group message, read, reply and report location which is then displayed on a map identifying all the responders within the group. Linking 2-way replies and location information with group broadcast that could include thousands of members, makes this is very powerful incident management tool.

Mobilising fire officers to respond to an incident quickly and effectively may seem like a simple procedure. However many fire services have first responders with different skill sets and expertise, requiring careful management of teams that may be spread over a geographical area.

A prime example is retained firefighters. Integral to today’s fire and rescue service, retained firefighters provide a service that gives emergency cover to more than 90 per cent of the UK. The advent of 2-way paging can offer organisations that rely on retained firefighters vast cost savings, by simply establishing the availability of full-time staff before requesting assistance of retained staff to supplement resources.

Another example is the National Resilience Assurance team who work hand-in hand with the UK fire and rescue service to support large-scale incidents. They have a team of 24 people located within the regions and have specialists in various capabilities dealing with floods, chemical disaster or terrorist attacks. It is critical that when any disaster happens all officers are made aware of the situation immediately so that they can instantly react and offer support to the affected fire and rescue service.

Communications were previously carried out using mobile phones and Blackberry devices over existing mobile networks but it became clear that this was unreliable, and issues regarding timely responses became prevalent. In contrast to their mobile devices, 2-way paging offered a far more effective channel dedicated to mobilising staff in time-critical situations whilst also ensuring rapid response times. Knowing who could attend and who was not available from the widespread team provided huge savings, not only in terms of efficient deployment of resources, but also cost. Key for National Resilience is that the Responder has greatly improved communication, thus the assurance that messages have been received and understood.

The Government may have slashed funding, however it is clear that technology has a huge role to play in alleviating some of the looming pressures stemming from budgetary cuts. To circumvent this imminent threat, professionals within the Fire Service should perhaps look at how both new and existing technology can provide innovative ways to drive efficiency, while continuing to maintain a high level of service.

If you are interested in discussing any of the issues raised in this article with a member of our team, contact us today or why not take a look at our full range of Messaging Integration Services.

The extent of the budget cuts being implemented to address the deficit has made reductions in headcount an unfortunate, yet unavoidable reality across both the public and private sector. The knock-on effect being that organisations of all types and sizes have been forced to reshuffle existing resources and consolidate roles and responsibilities.

The definition of lone worker has often been considered to be ambiguous. Traditionally, the term has been heavily geared towards individuals who work by themselves without close supervision, or mobile workers, working away from their fixed base. However, what is particularly interesting is that as cost efficiencies are being enforced across all sectors, the conventional idea of a lone worker continues to be challenged, and its remit extended even further. For example, cost savings have forced employers to rationalise an existing team into one single job role. Therefore, a switchboard operator within the NHS or retail staff working outside of typical working hours could now be considered a lone worker. In addition to this, many organisations are cutting office costs by downsizing and encouraging more staff to work from home. It’s these changes to the working world that have redefined the term lone worker, and ensured employers address the health, safety and wellbeing of staff at work.

With over 160 attacks reported on lone workers in the UK per day, and an estimated figure of 8 million of the UK workforce spending at least half, or their entire time away from their work base, safety has become a huge concern. In the face of crippling cuts, employers must still put in place measures to ensure the safety of their staff. Which is why a number of organisations are now beginning to consider how enhancements to existing technology can fulfil the day-to-day requirements, as well as diverse needs of lone worker personnel.

In response to market changes and PageOne’s own customer feedback, PageOne has been developing a suite of products tailored to the lone worker sector. For example, the 2-way Responder device has made a significant impact in this market because it offers reliable 2-way communication with the speed, assurance and reach of traditional paging coupled with the capacity to acknowledge and respond to paging broadcasts. More importantly, the technology embedded within the Responder also supports an emergency SOS button and GPS-based location tracking. So, with a single button press, an SOS alert can be generated and a map showing the individuals location instantly visible for action to be taken.

In other instances, organisations are also looking at how technology already allocated to staff can be utilised to meet this need. Which is why PageOne has built on some of the tried and tested features from our 2-way Responder, and developed a more extensive application for Smart Phone devices. Taking the Blackberry for example, we can offer our customers a lone worker application that sits within their current mobile device. Activation and deactivation of the lone worker status can be either driven by the handset holder or the administrator within the command and control centre. The beauty of this means that the device can instantaneously switch from a regular mobile phone, to an all-encompassing lone worker device. The Smart Phone application features a fully functional SOS alert, which can be forwarded to a mobile phone, smart distribution list, email, or a secure online dashboard for further action.

For a great number of organisations the cost of investing in lone working systems and processes is no longer prohibitive. Rather, mobile applications that extend the functionality of employees’ existing handsets – and remove the need for investment in dedicated hardware – could be the cost-effective solution for fulfilling the staff duty of care they are looking for.

If you are interested in discussing any of the issues raised in this article with a member of our team, contact us today or take a look at our advanced 2-way Responder Pager.

See the original article in Land Mobile Magazine >>

PageOne has a rich heritage and strong reputation in all aspects of messaging – from paging and SMS through to voice, email and location based services. The company has not only built its reputation on the resilient, robust and innovative nature of its technology, but also on its commitment to providing outstanding service and customer support. This has been recognised industry-wide with awards and accreditations such as Investor in Customers (IIC) and being the preferred supplier for the OGCbuying solutions Mobile Solutions framework for more than 10 years.

PageOne continues to innovate and bring new technologies to market such as the launch of the UK’s first MTPAS enabled 2-way pager and Lone Worker applications for Smart Phone devices. The company has also played an instrumental role in a number of industry milestones over the years, including the first to develop email on the move, the use of high speed FLEX for paging, and the development of Pulse – a dedicated emergency channel for Bluelight organisations.

“This is an extremely important milestone for PageOne, and one which we are delighted to celebrate with both our employees and our customers” commented Chris Jones, CEO, PageOne. Our customers are at the heart of everything we do, and their contribution to our products, in tandem with the sheer commitment, know-how, passion and drive from our employees, has without question helped shape our success over the past 25 years.”

PageOne’s systems are unique in that they are powered by the company’s own flexible platform Oventus launched in 2002 to enable the seamless integration of mobile messaging across different networks and technologies. These services have consistently been designed to meet and exceed the demands of an increasingly mobile environment.

Download the full release here

Join PageOne at this years Business Resilience in Supply Chain, 14 September 2011, Madejski Stadium – Reading, stand 2.