As the world emerges from the lockdown enforced by the Coronavirus pandemic, business owners and facilities managers will be under pressure to manage the occupancy of their buildings extremely prudently. Office and desk spaces will need to be adapted in order to comply with social distancing guidelines, and communal areas will also require close monitoring to prevent overcrowding.
With this in mind, IAconnects has adapted its proven people counting and desk management solutions to include two new social distancing management functions. The Social Distancing Room Management Kit (Part No. SD001) monitors the people count and occupancy status of communal areas such as washrooms, kitchens and meeting areas and displays access status accordingly. Once the count monitors occupancy at an acceptable level to be in accordance with social distancing rules then the access status of a particular area changes automatically. When the people flow count (in/out) reaches a certain limit a ‘cleaning required’ status can also be set to alert building maintenance staff that a particular area requires attention. A web-based dashboard also provides an instant overview of the overall building status.
The Social Distancing Desk Management kit (Part No. SD002) enables business owners and building managers to monitor desk occupancy and display availability and cleaning status accordingly. Operating in the same way as SD001, the ‘cleaning required’ status can be set to alert building maintenance staff that a particular desk requires attention. Digital displays are used to locally visualise the status of each desk.
Both kits include a MobiusFlow Wi-Fi Gateway and 12 months’ MobiusFlow subscription. The SD001 comes pre-configured with people counters and visual displays, while the SD002 is pre-configured with 25 desk occupancy sensors and visual displays. The number of devices for each kit can be scaled as required.
Dave Lister, managing director of IAconnects, said: “People will understandably be apprehensive about returning to work post-lockdown, particularly if they work in buildings with a smaller floor area. Our simple system can show visual notifications of room state based upon flow of people through a communal area and change status accordingly. For example, if social distancing measures only allow three people in a washroom or kitchen due to the available space then the room status display can be changed from green to red or ‘enter’ to ‘no entry’ once this limit has been met, only changing back again when the number drops below the specified limit. The system can also notify the facilities management team to clean each room based on the flow count.”
Dave continued: “With our social distancing desk management a sensor can be placed under the desk, at a team table, reception desk or any location occupied by a person. It is the combined measurement of all these positions that provide valuable insights into how your space is used.”