Safely reopening your business amidst COVID-19

Depending on where you live, some COVID-19 restrictions are easing, allowing businesses to reopen. There’s no doubt that the pandemic has impacted the economy, but that doesn’t mean your business can’t adapt to the new circumstances. Implementing new practices that put customers’ safety first is critical, and so is having an intelligent video surveillance system with real-time alerts. With this type of solution, you can be sure that your organization is implementing new health and safety and physical distancing rules, and you can rapidly respond to situations that present a potential risk.

Let’s look at a few of the benefits of these systems:

Occupancy management and elevated body temperature alerts

Physical distancing is a term that everyone is now familiar with due to COVID-19, and to help enforce it, health officials recommend that retail stores, banks and businesses limit the number of people who enter an establishment at the same time. To monitor how many people are entering your facility, a reliable video surveillance system with the right IoT devices and real-time alerts will notify you when your business is close to its occupancy threshold, or when it has exceeded it. It can display occupancy data on a local monitor, or on a central dashboard, which makes it easy to see several locations at once.

In the case of March Networks, our intelligent video also integrates with smart lighting systems for a visible representation of your building’s capacity. If the lightbulb is green, you can still allow more occupants, but if it’s red, you’ve exceeded your limit.

COVID-19 has generated immense interest in thermal imaging cameras as a tool to identify individuals with elevated body temperatures. If you’re using these cameras, consider an open platform video system that can support third-party devices. With this type of integration it’s possible to receive instant messages when someone enters your establishment with an elevated body temperature. You can also receive email alerts, which will allow you to view a still image for a quick assessment of the situation before reviewing the corresponding video and taking action.

March Networks Health Compliance Solution

Cleaning and sanitization

One of the most important aspects of reopening is ensuring that employees follow proper cleaning and sanitization practices. It’s critical that you train your employees to frequently wipe down high-touch surfaces, but it’s also a good idea to visually demonstrate you empathize with your customers and their concern for re-entry. Having your employees wear masks, installing Plexiglass partitions to divide point-of-sale (POS) systems, and having floor markers to indicate where to stand in line are all ways to show customers you’re taking the new regulations seriously.

Once these practices are in place, you can use remote video monitoring to check in on your business no matter where you are. You can even have alerts set up to ensure your employees are following the right sanitization procedures. This is incredibly important, especially for restaurants.

The National Restaurant Association’s reopening guidelines place a strong emphasis on employee handwashing. The rules outline that handwashing should last at least 20 seconds and when soap and water isn’t available, hand sanitizers with at least 60% alcohol content should be used.

With an intelligent video solution, you can access a database of video capturing every handwashing occurrence. You can sort each instance by date, time and location to ensure that each employee is following the proper guidelines.

Loss prevention and suspicious activity

When it comes to reopening, loss prevention and suspicious activity should remain one of your top concerns. While you’ll want to ensure your employees are adhering to new business practices, you’ll also want to continue to monitor theft and unusual behavior. Some experts believe that internal fraud will increase post-pandemic due to employees feeling the effects of decreased hours and lost wages. A video surveillance solution that can monitor all areas of your business – including POS stations, the break room, and all entrances and exits – is critical. This will allow you to see those areas at-a-glance, no matter where you are.

A good video solution will integrate with your POS to allow you to create reports and drill down to look at specific transactions. For example, if you’re noticing a suspicious amount of returns, overrides or low-ticket purchases, you can click on them to view details. Time of transaction, employee who performed the transaction and even the corresponding video will give you the full picture of what happened.

Promotions and customer service

A large part of recovering lost sales due to COVID-19 will be training your staff to maximize every opportunity with customers.

For restaurants, this might mean upselling to customers in the dining room or at the drive-thru window. Promotions will increase your average ticket and help to win back customers who haven’t been coming because of the pandemic restrictions.

For banks, this might be initiating conversations about interest rates or other financial products. For other businesses, it could be offering new curbside pick-up locations.

A reliable video surveillance system will allow you to set up your cameras so that you have the best views of all of these areas. High-resolution cameras allow you to see if employees are selling the right products at the appropriate times and if they’re offering promotions.

You might be cautious about reopening post-pandemic, but there are some positives to focus on. Getting your employees back to work full time, satisfying your customers and increasing your sales are all achievable goals. The right video solution can help with all of these objectives, and give you peace of mind knowing you are complying with new health and safety regulations.

To learn more about March Networks’ video solution for reopening during COVID-19, visit: https://www.marchnetworks.com/health-compliance-solution/