My sales team approached me with a great question from a potential client today:

Why should I choose your handheld device over a fixed reader in our parking lot for emergency mustering?

My answer was, “That is too easy!  Let me list out the top reasons.” After I had quickly come up with a dozen reasons, I paused. After all, people still argue over Coke and Pepsi, and there aren’t many differences between the two.

As in most cases where a customer has options, there are always tradeoffs. There are some legitimate reasons why a customer might want a pole muster reader. Continue to the end of this article for those reasons.

While both a mobile muster reader and a fixed pole reader might be used to account for people during an emergency, there are some apparent reasons not to use a pole reader. Here are my top 12:

A Dozen Reasons Not to Use a Fixed Muster Pole/Station

1. It’s expensive to trench to pole reader location.
2. Requires installation of electricity and network.
3. May not function when electricity and networking go down.
4. Open target for graffiti, vandalism, abuse, or vehicular damage.
5. If the wind blows smoke or gas to the muster site, the pole becomes dangerous and useless.
6. It is impossible to move further away if the hazard is large.
7. There is no direct way to see the full occupancy of buildings from the pole.
8. If the pole is inside a fenced area, employees could be trapped.
9. No way to account for an employee with a lost badge during an emergency.
10. Serves only a single function – a muster reader in a parking lot.
11. Pole reader reports to the Access Control System in building, which could be burning.
12. Any system with a post reader requires a person with a separate device to know who is and isn’t safe.

Overall, fixed muster readers can come with high costs, limited functionality, and no mobility. Telaeris’ XPID200 handheld reader with XPressEntry connected to an access control system addresses every concern.

• No physical installation requirements.
• Easy to move to maintain employee safety and accountability.
• Able to see facility occupancy and last employee location at each device.
• Operates with or without network and electrical services.
• Multi-use capability (bus entry, temporary gates, trainings, event attendance).

 

This said, there is one situation where a fixed pole reader has the advantage.

If your facility has few employees with no ability to have evacuation managers, it can allow people to be accounted for from a remote security station.

Some security integration companies prefer selling pole readers because they are effectively only a very expensive Wiegand door reader, which they can install and forget. This type of installation is generally a poor mustering system as access control is meant to control entry, not account for employees.

When a company does invest in a mustering system, there is a temptation to check the boxes of “Regulatory Compliance” and “Reaffirms Company Commitment to Safety Standards”. Our suggestion is to go beyond signaling good intentions and to find the best solution for:

• Keeping Your People Safe in Most Situations
• Accurately View Facility Occupancy
• Increase Speed of Accounting for People.
• Identifying People’s Last Known Locations
• Operate Online or Offline at a moment’s notice.

Want to learn more about setting your company up to effectively handle Emergency Evacuations? We created a free Emergency Evacation guide.

If you need help figuring out the right mustering solution for your company, please contact us!