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If you have been tasked with organising an event you will be responsible for arranging a huge number of different things all at once, from catering to guest lists and stage placement.

Organising event security is perhaps the most important task for any event manager, but far too often this crucial factor is overlooked and left to the last minute.

Here are 5 tips for ensuring your event has the proper security, keeping guests and VIPs safe and protected at all times.

1. Get to know the venue

Every event is different and the security measures which will be required will depend heavily on the venue, the surrounding area, and a number of other factors.

To ensure that your security is the best it can be, it is vital that you do a full survey of the platform and the surrounding area beforehand.

If the area where you are hosting your event, for example, has a high crime rate, you may need to hire additional security staff or install additional measures than you would in another area.

It is also worth checking if the venue itself has its own security staff who will be able to give you all the information you need based on their experience of similar size events in the past.

If you would rather leave this to a professional, then your local security firm here at Prime Secure will be delighted to conduct this survey for you, with one of our highly trained experts using their trained eye to identify the measures that need to be put in place to ensure your event runs as smoothly as possible.

2. Know the event

If you have been tasked with keeping an event secure, it is important that you have an in-depth understanding of the event itself and the possible security threats that may arise.

Are there 100 people attending or 10,000? Are there VIPs that need additional protection, what time is the event taking place?

These are just some of the questions, among many, that you will need to know the answers to before you can begin to plan an effective security strategy.

This information will be used to decide where security officers would be deployed most effectively, where access control and crowd control are required, and whether any specific security equipment is required.

3. Make a Plan

Having effective security in place is essential to ensure the safety of guests during an event and should be taken extremely seriously.

Having a well-designed clear security plan based on intelligence gathered will help your security team know their role at every single moment throughout the event and help run a smooth, and most importantly safe, operation.

Some of the things that should be included in your event security plan include:

• Security guard positioning
• VIP areas
• Entrance and exit points – Including any access control technologies that will be required.
• The routes taken by mobile patrol security guards
• Placing and guarding requirements of any stage area.

4. Hire Professional Staff

You could have the best event security plan even to be created, but it will only be effective if carried out by a team of fully trained, qualified, and experienced security professionals.

Every single individual that you hire to carry out any sort of security role at your event should hold the relevant licences for that position and should be registered to provide security services.

Not only is this crucial to the safety of guests and VIPs, but a failure to do so will invalidate any insurance you have for the event and there could be legal repercussions.

All security officers that you hire should be SIA licensed at a minimum, and it is essential that you keep track of their identities using ID cards and cross-check their entries.

Unprofessional staff may also be susceptible to letting individuals without a ticket or who are banned from such events into the venue, which would make your security plan, based on a certain number of attendees, redundant, and put all other guests at significant risk.

5. Utilise Security Equipment

Security technology has come on leaps and bounds in recent years, and providing effective security has never been easier as a result.

Access control gates, CCTV, and alarms should be used in any major event as standard, making if far easier for your Event security team to keep an eye over the entire venue and control exactly who is on the premises at any one time.

If you are hosting an event somewhere that doesn’t have permanent CCTV, Alarms etc. such as is the case with a festival or similar there are a range of temporary alternatives available.

Mobile CCTV towers, that required no mains electricity access, and can easily be installed and taken away when the event is finished, are a great example of how technology can be utilised to maximise event security in the modern age.

Many people think that burglary is completely random and that being targeted is simply a matter of terrible luck.

Whilst there is certainly an element of wrong place wrong time in having your home or car targeted by criminals, there are several simple measures that you can take to reduce the chances from being the victim of a burglary.

As Covid-19 restrictions lift across the UK, and schools and workplaces return to relatively normal operations, more and more of us are leaving our homes unoccupied for large periods of the day.

Burglars are primed to take advantage of this shift as this as the fewer people in close vicinity the higher the chances of getting in and out of a property without being detected.

What is important to understand is that the vast majority of domestic burglaries are not planned out but are committed by opportunist criminals who tend to target properties that appear unoccupied and have limited or no visible security.

A few simple security measures are usually enough to send burglars on their way and convince them that your property simply isn’t worth the effort.

Here are some of the best ways to keep your home and car safe from opportunist burglars:

Windows and Doors

Sometimes the simplest security measures are the most effective, and simply ensuring that all your windows and doors are closed and locked at night, and when your property is unoccupied, will make access a lot harder for burglars.

Many opportunist burglars will simply walk around a neighbourhood on the lookout for unoccupied properties, checking for any open windows and trying front and back doors for easy access.

It may seem surprising, but by simply locking windows and doors in your home you may have already prevented your home being targeted by burglars.

To reduce the appeal of your property even further it is worth upgrading older doors and windows as they may not have the same number of security features as modern alternatives.

The longer it would take for a burglar to break in through a locked window or door the highest the chance of you or your neighbour becoming aware of their presence and burglars will tend to focus on homes with older fixtures for this reason.

Casement windows are one of the most secure windows available as they are almost impossible to open from the outside as there is no lock to pick and have a complex internal mechanism.

Install CCTV

Installing a home CCTV system is one of the most effective deterrents you can take against burglars.

Despite this, just 14% of UK homeowners say that they have CCTV cameras installed according to a study by Co-op insurance.

If a burglar sees visible evidence of a CCTV system on your home, even just a doorbell cam, they will almost always move on elsewhere, deeming the risk of being detected and later identified by the police as much too high.

Should the worst happen, and your property is targeted you will be able to use the footage to provide evidence to the police, in court, and to give to your insurance company.

Lighting

Discretion is the best friend of any budding burglar and lighting up your driveway the moment a potential intruder sets foot on your property is a great way to scare them off.

Motion activated lights are a simple and cost-effective measure that you should install on the outside of your property to help keep criminals at bay by making their presence blatantly obvious to residents and passers-by.

Another way to increase lighting on your property is to ensure that there are no large trees or bushes blocking streetlights or hiding your property from view.

Keep vegetation and fences to a maximum of 1m high at the front of your property to increase visibility from the main road and make approaching your property undetected an impossible task.

Alarm System

Installing an alarm system in your home is another great active deterrent against opportunist burglars.

You can easily purchase a DIY alarm system from a hardware store than can be installed on your windows or near other entry points to alert residents and neighbours to potential intruders.

Once activated a loud siren or other noise will emit from the alarms speaker system causing the vast majority of intruders to turn on their heels and make a swift exit.

For maximum protection, you could have a fully integrated and monitored Burglar Alarm Glasgow installed by a professional security company.

A professional installer will ensure that there is a visible alarm box installed on the front of your property, high out of reach to avoid tampering, which will let anyone approaching the property that the system is primed and operational.

Contact Central FS

For more information on home security from a BAFE accredited industry leading expert, or to arrange a home survey today, contact Central FS now on 0141 530 1244.