Building Managers Preparation for the Holiday Season

What can building managers do to prepare for the holiday season… from a security firm perspective!

The holiday season indeed spells out mayhem for many operators of hi-rise accommodation apartments.

For 50 years FRANKsecure has been servicing many of these facilities, and over this time I can certainly say there are recurring issues year in year out. Whilst we pride ourselves in providing a fast turn around for job requests this approaching time of year presents logistical problems in trying to maintain those turn around times so being prepared can be a wise ploy.

  1. Locks do fail. Prepare yourself by purchasing 2 or more spare locksets ready to swap over a failed lockset so you can keep your guest rooms functional.
  2. Registered Security Keys are a fantastic mechanism to improve the security and control of keys for apartment buildings.
    1. If your facility utilises a registered security key system be sure that you have any reserve locks pre-prepared on your system.
    2. The reserve locks I suggest should have their own key and should only be used whilst the original lock is being serviced or replaced.
    3. Be sure to have extra common area keys ordered and ready to distribute.
  3. Try and do an audit now to discover problem locks and missing keys so you can have them rectified before you become busy.
  4. Test your camera systems,
    1. can you extract footage in the situation of an event?
    2. Do you have the login passwords?
    3. Is your system still recording?
    4. Have you cleaned the camera lenses?
  5. Emergency plan for power outages. Many hi-rise facilities rely on an access control system for opening garage doors, the entry foyer door and to operate the lifts. Summer season presents a high probability of electrical storm activity which can play havoc with power supplies and subsequently plays havoc on your access system.
    1. What is your plan should the power fail?
    2. Can you provide a mechanical solution to gain entry or to secure entries reliant on powered access control systems?
    3. You may need to discuss the situation between your lift service agent and your access control service agent to develop a convenient way to achieve a manual way of operating lifts in these events.