ID’s and Access Cards

The workers of a company that manufactures oxidation pollution control equipment and air flotation dryers, are constantly operating in areas and setting that are very risky and dangerous the majority of these areas require lockout panels. The way it works out is that the workers, put locks on air, gas or electrical supplies to be certain that nothing happens while they're working on the machinery. To prevent incoming liquid from reaching them they may simply put a lock on a drain.

According to environmental health safety/security manager, someone who accidentally tries to operate a machine while others are performing maintenance on it are can easily put them in danger of being electrocuted, crushed or sprayed with toxic chemicals.

In order to further magnify the vitality of these locks, the company attached an ID card with the company logo, a picture of the worker with his name on it, as well as a sign that reads, that warns against opening the lock before making sure that no one is performing maintenance on the equipment.

The facilities administrators urge all companies to have a protective technique similar to theirs "while some companies display a standard warning tag, others may choose to write out the textual data every time. However for this company, they had a very personal approach that hits close to home faster. Individuals and employees who see a person's face and name are not likely to play around with the lock. This practical solution only costs the company about two dollars for every card.

Adding on, the manufacturing company utilizes no-technology access cards cards for access to confined locations. When shop or field service workers travel to patron sites, they often are required to work in restricted locations. This could be any perimeter, chamber or room that is large enough for workers to access and operate in, but not fashioned for continuous human occupancy because of the narrow exit and entrance space.

This is so simply because these settings are extremely risky there might be limited air exchange which can cause individuals to easily suffocate. Workers die in confined settings on almost all the time. For this reason the Occupational Safety and Health Administration mandated extensive preparations and actual training on how to carry out and control hazards in limited locations, and how to effectively manage the hazards upon making a safe entrance.

In the case of the products of this manufacturing company, oxidizers will probably need to be examined on the inside once they are fully operating. Furthermore, for safety and satisfaction reasons the customers will need some sort of proof that the employee has had appropriate training and recertification, which is done on a yearly basis.

However, The ID cards used in this company were durable enough to last longer than the recertification deadline. Not to mention that they do not need to worry about the smearing of someone's signature.

Moreover, the ID card also shows a scanned signature along with the expiration date. It meets OSHA mandates, has a worker's photo, is sturdy and is effortless to generate.

Upholding the Supervision

The manufacturing company initially started utilizing ID badges more than ten years ago when a worker from one of its business opponents unnoticeably entered into the company’s property and started to basically spy and gather information about their performance. It did not take much time before the administrators realized this and build a fence around the entire facility as well as setting up access control points at every potential entrance. In the present day, the company's security has become more refined with close to twelve access control points along with eight levels of access control. In addition, it has unique ID cards for forklift operators besides to workers taking care of lockout conditions.

Limiting the amount individuals entering the location was critical for them especially since their equipment designs were privately owned and run.

The company initially started its business in the printing and papermaking industries, which still correspond to the company's main patrons. However, at the moment the company offers equipment to any industry that mandates its products to be dried on an air cushion. Not counting these air flotation dryers, the company also creates oxidizers that burn complex air polluting hydrocarbons into less toxic elements.

Although the engineering behind the whole process is very complex, the actual technology is pretty basic. They have had a number of different ID badge programs for their security setups throughout the years. They were simply unsatisfied with what they already had. To start with their printers would repeatedly break down, also it was complicated to replace the ribbons and clean the machines due to the frequent jamming of the printers.

Luckily, the administrators of the company discovered Fargo printers on the Internet about four years ago and purchased an appropriate “cost effective” card Printing/Encoding machine.

About 1,000 badges have been printed since they made that purchase. The quality of all these cards was very good. They were extremely satisfied with the printer due to it efficiency, ease of use, and rapidness of operation. Not to mention that it was a very stylish machine that was well worth the money spent on it. No effort or motion was wasted by it.

The company today offers ID cards for not one, but eight levels of access. Maintenance workers, first aid providers and key managers are automatically assigned to the master level which enables them to go to practically any location in the facility. On the other hand, there are three strategic access levels:  One to allow guests into the outside gate only one for suppliers, another one for those who restock manufacturing the products. In addition to that, a research and development level allows workers to be inside the research and development premises. Furthermore workers of the shop have access to the manufacturing location through an employee access point. The shop crew managers also have access that permits them into areas to talk to others about documents and plans. Last but not least, workers can receive office access that gives them access to areas.

Offering a Fair Ability of Access Flexible Access
The ID badges of this company are in act smart cards which utilize using HID read-only technology of proximity. The company's software encodes access levels onto an induction coil. Cleverly, the cards themselves don't reveal a worker’s level of access. However, whenever necessary, the security software used by the company enables Campbell to program new information into the card.

According to the company’s security manager, this flexibility in control enables them to alter the access levels when they need to. For instance, a worker may need R&D access only for a short period of time; a group of other workers may join the first aid squad. This technology allows them to change access without having to amend the entire card.

Furthermore, to guarantee visual identification the borders around the photos on each badge are color-coded. Blue is for security staff, green is for vendors red is for employees, and white is used for children on who may visit the facility as a fieldtrip.

They thought it would be a good gesture to give the kids a badge just like their fathers and mothers, it would certainly make them appreciate the badges more.

The truth of the matter is that each ID card actually serves two functions. Every card retains a barcode with a worker's time clock number for utilization with the companie's optical bar-code reader.

somebody determined that using barcodes was the most appropriate solution with 180 hourly store workers. Nowadays, all office workers have their identificaiton cards barcoded, as well, in case they ever decide to use the technology for supply management or other accounting functions. This somebody, whomever he is, was certainly preparing for the future. Luckily, anybody can jump right in and utilize the barcode techology for an endless amount of functions.

On top of deploying general security measures, the company also utilizes ID cards without technology to verify workers who have been certified to opertae a forklifter. This official recognition is required  every three years, as well as evaluation and operator training.

The security administratore of the company admitted that the only way that they can limit the number of people who come into the facility is to constatnly keep their security system up to date, specifically their access control interface. So far, the installed access contorol system has provided them with many benefits which they still wonder how they were able to manage without them.