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Laing O’Rourke – one of the biggest civil
engineering companies in the UK
Aurora was first approached by Laing O’Rourke
back in 2000, by their Head of Security. The company suspected
that they might have activities such as ‘buddy punching’ and
‘ghost workers’ on their sites, and were therefore looking for
a solution that would greatly improve their knowledge of exactly
who was on site at any one time. They were interested in a
verification product that Aurora had recently developed called ‘Clockface’
– a clocking system using facial recognition software.
Traditional methods of clocking on,
using clock cards, have been used by construction companies for
considerable time, but such methods can be susceptible to
fraudulent wage activity, as well as producing laborious
paperwork. Clockface, using facial recognition technologies,
ensures that the person presenting themselves to the system, is
indeed the person they say they are, which effectively wipes out
fraudulent wage activities. Every worker is given a PIN number
which is stored with their photo and employee details in the
system. So if someone presents themselves to the system, and types
in a PIN number which does not match the correct face, they will
not be allowed to clock on. In addition, clockface records all
these type of false attempts to clock on, so there is a record of
who has been denied.
Laing O’Rourke initially installed the
system at one site to test its effectiveness. It proved so
successful, that they soon started to roll out the system across
many major sites in the UK. They now have scores of verification
points and major sites have included:
- Terminal 5 at Heathrow
- The new Scottish Parliament Building
- Glasgow Airport
- The Bull Ring redevelopment in Birmingham
- The Channel Tunnel Rail Link programme
Using the Clockface system alone
improved site and payroll management. However Laing O’Rourke
were keen to improve their systems and reduce costs even further,
and asked if Aurora could work with them to ‘automate’ the
production of timesheets.
This required some extensive development work,
to take into account numerous variables specific to the industry,
such as different work breakdown codes, shift patterns, rates of
pay and overtime rates that differ from trade to trade. However,
after several months working closely with colleagues from Laing O’Rourkes,
the Aurora Timekeeper software became available. After a couple of
careful trials on different sites, the software is used widely
across the Laing O’Rourke Group. Working in conjunction with
Laing O’Rourke with regards to the design, production and
testing of the product, has ensured a product fit for purpose
within the construction industry. The technology now has the
flexibility to:
- record clocking data and translate this
into timesheets;
- analyse clocking data in respect of work
breakdown codes;
- report on trades, contractors and
individual employees, assisting with labour returns;
- relay important health and safety messages
and graphics to employees as a whole, groups or individuals;
- eliminate ‘ghost workers’ and ‘buddy
punching’;
- allow clocking data to be analysed and
viewed remotely.
For more information on ClockFace and
TimeKeeper, please do get in touch.
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