Like many councils, St Edmundsbury had a dilemma. Whether to build and staff a new control room or look for another Council or third party to assume responsibility. They decided there were significant benefits to providing the service in-house, but they needed to streamline the systems they supported and generate an income stream to offset their monitoring costs.

The goal should be more than money

Okay so you can make more money but if that’s your only goal, the extra zeroes on your bank balance will get really boring real quick.

ShopSafe delivers a fully integrated radio network across all the major towns – Bury St Edmunds, Newmarket, Haverhill, Stowmarket and Mildenhall with further expansion planned. Working to an agreed Service Level Commitment, common standards are delivered for everything from training to signage.

Whilst ShopSafe migrated the existing analogue radio system to digital in Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket, Newmarket was provided by another company. ShopSafe was asked to provide a common control system, but the different technologies limited the functionality, and made the system somewhat inflexible with different operating procedures and training.

ShopSafe deliver comprehensive support including Service Exchange and Batteries for Life and training using both traditional and digital media. With 20 years experience, ShopSafe know every high street head office and procurement route to ensure payment for the radio and the Councils component for monitoring to secure their income generation is guaranteed.

About the Client & The Challenges

St Edmundsbury Borough Council and Forest Heath District Council, have worked together for the last eight years, delivering significant savings and improvements to services. With a joint population of 175,000 and a revenue budget of £100M they are considering a proposal to form a single Council for West Suffolk to deliver the greatest benefits for local businesses and communities including value for money, cost savings, simplicity, self sufficiency and resilience.

"Building a new CCTV Control room demanded significant investment and a solid business case to proceed. "

One of the earliest integrations was an amalgamate of their CCTV control rooms into a single centre. With disparate CCTV and town link radio systems from different manufacturers this provided a significant challenge. The solution however provided significant savings but was a challenge operationally and looking forward it was impossible to plan a migration path to new technology.

Whilst ShopSafe migrated the existing analogue radio system to digital in Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket, Newmarket was provided by another company. ShopSafe was asked to provide a common control system, but the different technologies limited the functionality, and made the system somewhat inflexible with different operating procedures and training.

ShopSafe deliver comprehensive support including Service Exchange and Batteries for Life and training using both traditional and digital media. With 20 years experience, ShopSafe know every high street head office and procurement route to ensure payment for the radio and the Councils component for monitoring to secure their income generation is guaranteed.