Brighter Futures – Tailored Solutions

About Brighter Futures

Brighter Futures help people to lead fulfilled lives. They believe that with tailored support, their customers can be empowered to recognise and develop their strengths, confidence and self-esteem, manage their lives positively and build aspirations. 

Life circumstances such as homelessness, abuse, bereavement, and mental illness can affect us all. A roof over your head is where Brighter Futures start. Each year their team of over 200 staff and volunteers support people with complex needs through personalised accommodation, employment, training and mental health support.  

Find out more at – https://www.brighter-futures.org.uk/

Meeting Our Customers’ Needs

The team at Brighter Futures provide help, advice, and support for people with varied and complex needs and much of this support is provided on a one-to-one basis. Their staff work within the community or at resident’s homes, frequently working alone with vulnerable people who can behave unpredictably. Even staff who work in fixed establishments such as hostels often find themselves in lone working situations when they deal with incidents in different areas of a building alone. 

Many of Brighter Future’s services operate 24 hours a day, 365 days of the year, meaning night shifts are common. Due to the high-risk nature of their working environments, the Brighter Futures team needed a reliable, cost-effective way to summon support in the event of a threatening situation, accident, or emergency. 

Brighter Future’s community services staff regularly work with victims of domestic abuse and anti-social behaviour which can often involve a higher level of risk. As staff members often work alone or in pairs, Gentoo required a lone worker solution to help protect their staff in the event of a threatening situation or emergency.

Providing Real Solutions

After initial consultation and a full assessment with each team, we trialled a range of devices and Apps to find out what best suited their needs. Following the trial it was clear from feedback that our RedAlert SOS Alarm Fob would be most appropriate due to the ease of use and discreet nature of the device. Their team felt that a phone App may be seen by the customer as being threatening or obtrusive, so they opted for the highly discreet Fob that can be activated by a single touch of a button. 

Lone worker solutions are completely ineffective if the user isn’t comfortable with the device or its functions, which is why we place such a value on effective training. Low device utilisation is one of the key problems faced by companies trying to protect their lone working staff, but Orbis are highly experienced in breaking down these barriers to ensure that users are utilising their device, and as a result are protected within their roles. 

The RedAlert SOS Alarm Fob is a fully compliant and accredited BS8484 solution, that when activated, will alert our 24/7 ARC (Alarm Receiving Centre) team to respond appropriately to the situation. Our ARC team have direct Police control room access and can bypass 999 services, saving valuable time in the case of an emergency for frontline staff. 

Our ARC team will support any Red Alert activations with an emergency response, but on occasions when staff may just feel vulnerable in a situation, they can speak to our team under our ‘Stay with me’ service which enables the ARC Operator to stay with the user until they feel in a safer situation. This reassures staff members that our team are available to support them 24/7/365 no matter what the situation may be.  

Brighter Futures were highly impressed with the RedALert Fob and have issued them to a number of their other teams across a range of departments including Homeless, Clubhouse Network, Women’s Criminal Justice, Learning Disability, Adult Sex Workers, Safe Spaces, and Housing.