Thomas Cook has replaced its signalling and the associated telephone costs, a service that had been costing the company around GB pound 150,000 annually, with Chiron’s Iris system. Steve Nelson, Group Security Manager at Thomas Cook, points out that after recouping the modest capital investment associated with equipment installation, he anticipates substantial monitoring cost savings of some 70% a year, compared with the previous system.
The IP system has the option of dual-path signalling in addition to regular polling between an individual site and Thomas Cook’s alarm receiving centre, which is provided by Romec Electronic Security. Each branch uses a Scantronic alarm panel supplied by Cooper Security and the decision to update Thomas Cook’s Wide Area Network (WAN) across all its locations led to trials to identify the best means of providing secure communication between each travel agency site and the monitoring station. The chosen product also needed to be compatible with both existing alarm panel types in place at the branches. A successful pilot installation programme led to the recent completion of a full rollout across all of the travel agency’s branch network.
Nelson said Chiron won the contract because Iris is easy to install, is a self contained unit small enough to fit into the company’s alarm panels, and has enhanced capabilities such as being able to accept dynamic as well as fixed IP addresses.
Visual verification
Thomas Cook is also examining the potential of a recent addition to the Iris system range – a software module which allows visual verification of an alarm alert. Using the Visual Verification Suite, pictures from existing cameras can be sent direct to the monitoring centre operator’s screen simultaneously with the alarm activation, allowing the operator to scan pre- and post-event images to help verify the cause of an alert.
Nelson notes that this ‘future proofing’ technology would also allow the company’s regional sales managers to remotely dial in to stores to observe customer flows and other management-related issues, adding value to the equipment and helping Thomas Cook to improve its efficiency and ongoing revenue.
Commenting on the overall standard of service provided by Chiron, he adds: “I’ve been impressed with the company’s level of technical support and its liaison with Romec Electronic Security and our internal IT department, which has enabled us to resolve inevitable network difficulties during the installation phase of this project and roll it out smoothly. Chiron’s Iris system has also proved its reliability and substantially added value to our network.”
Keith Donovan, Chiron Security Communications’ MD, said: “Iris is supported by over 50 monitoring centres across Europe and is applicable to all systems from high security to residential. Many alarm panel manufacturers are now offering Iris technology embedded within their panels and the system is independently certified to EN50131 and 50136 approved to Grade 4 ATS-6.”
