Safety app also for Austria

Swiss Kone fitters have already been using the digital safety app Uepaa for three years. The modern version of the dead-man device is now also being launched in Austria.

The aim is provide improved protection for those working alone in the shaft – also without an active telephone connection, the company emphasised.

Kone Switzerland has been relying on the safety function of the solo-worker app Uepaa since 2021 and has been able to accumulate good experience with it. "The application has great advantages compared to the old dead-man devices. It also triggers an alarm where there is no mobile phone reception without the fitters having to set up antenna and wire the shaft," explained Patrick Matzinger, Kone Safety Manager DACH (Germany, Austria, Switzerland) Region South.

Uepaa facilitates automatic calls for help

Photo: © Kone / Uepaa

Working alone is not in general prohibited in Austria and Switzerland, but it requires special safety precautions. Effective monitoring and assistance must be guaranteed at remote workplaces and where there is an enhanced risk of accidents. Uepaa facilitates automatic calls for help when those affected themselves are no longer capable of this.

In Switzerland, 50 Kone employees and 30 employees from subcontractors, such as fitters and customer service engineers, are already using the app on their company cell phones. In the event of an alarm, the person affected is first called twice and if there is no reply, the emergency call control room is contacted. If this does not work, an ambulance is called. In addition, all Uepaa users in a circumference of two kilometres are called – whoever accepts the call is provided with the precise location and can assist.

Practised behaviour in the event of false alarms

Photo: © Kone / Uepaa

"Uepaa cooperates with the Medicall emergency call headquarters – a professional emergency call control room that helps people worldwide round the clock, 365 days a year. Austria will also be connected to it. Uepaa, originally a spin-off of the ETH Zürich, looks after numerous large companies, such as Swisscom or the Swiss railways," emphasised Kone manager Matzinger.

False alarms occur frequently, due to unanswered calls for example, according to the Kone press release. This was routine for the alarm control room. A problem directly with the employee or within the team was solved in over 99 percent of the cases. Up to now, calling an ambulance by Medicall has never been necessary at Kone Switzerland.

How does the app work? The Uepaa safety app was especially developed for those building environments in which there is no reception and conventional means of communication do not work reliably, such as new buildings without a WLAN installation or during maintenance work on customer premises, Kone underlined.

The Uepaa safety app features various functions that guarantee the safety and efficiency of the staff in such environments:
1. One vital function is the manual position-finding at the current deployment site, in which Kone employees communicate their location and other details on the deployment location via a previously established "emergency daily contact". This measure is intended to guarantee fast and efficient searching while field service technicians are working on customer premises, even in large building complexes.
2. In addition, the Uepaa app provides near-field search by means of an acoustic alarm. This is intended to enable emergency services to locate Kone employees within seconds as soon as they arrive. This function had proved to be highly effective, especially for work in shafts and contributed significantly to the fitters’ safety, Kone explained.

The following factors are decisive for position-finding on the company premises:
• GPS location: current location, which building, etc.
• Filed alarm sequence: additional information, such as departments, floors, etc.
• Indoor BLE location information: the BLE beacon last passed or currently visible
• Current deployment location: the so-called daily emergency contact permits filing of a temporary deployment location.
• Acoustic near-field location: the accident victim can be localised within seconds via the piercing signal of the Uepaa app.

More information: kone.at
kone.ch