Case Histories › Kensington & Chelsea (Notting Hill Carnival)

Reliable communications in a noisy and unpredictable environment

A million people flood into London’s Notting Hill for the carnival over the August Bank Holiday. The happy noise makes communications difficult for more than 100 enforcement officers from the Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea who are on duty to ensure compliance with regulations. Autopage provides a robust and reliable text messaging system which keeps officers in touch with the centre of operations.

Reliable communications in a noisy and unpredicatable environment

Notting Hill Carnival, traditionally held each year over the August Bank Holiday weekend, is known for its vibrant, colourful costumes and loud music with the sound of Caribbean steel bands and Socca-DJ’s loudly filling the air.

But not everyone attending the festivities is there to take in the music. For the enforcement officers of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea these are days of work. The two-day Carnival is a community-run event but the borough provides the infrastructure for it and must cope with over a million people flooding into Notting Hill. Over 100 enforcement officers and inspectors are on duty checking on compliance with regulations relating to hygiene, health and safety, licensing and other areas.

Since 2001, an Autopage text messaging system has been used to cut through the noise and give officers the security and peace of mind of knowing they can stay in touch.

Problem

The Borough’s Special Events Officer, Adrian Hodgson, explains: “The carnival is a very noisy environment and we can’t use normal radios or telephones because you simply can’t hear anything in some areas. Prior to 2001, we used a system that could only send messages, not receive them. So we had no way of knowing if our officers were receiving our communications.”

“We needed something which was more responsive than our old system, with more interaction so we could monitor our staff and ensure they were alright.”

Solution

Autopage text messaging is now the primary mode of communication. The system has been tailored over the past five years to meet the borough’s specific needs, including switching to using the internet for instant delivery of text messages and elimination of queuing.

“We started off with a single use platform which worked through a normal mobile SIM and a modem for paging,” says Mr Hodgson “However, we found time could be lost queuing messages and we were concerned if the ‘phone network went down we would lose communication altogether”

The system is now run from a laptop in the communications centre at the heart of the Carnival area, giving mobility to the operator if necessary. Messages can be sent to individual officers, to specific groups within a given area or to the whole group. A standard text message is sent every hour asking officers to reply. They text back and their reply is logged on a spreadsheet.

One of the biggest advantages for enforcement officers and inspectors is they don’t have to answer their ‘phone if they are busy dealing with an enforcement issue. Their mobile will vibrate, alerting them to the incoming text, but they can then reply when they have finished the job in hand.

The Autopage system is used solely for the Carnival, so it needed to be extremely cost-effective for just two days’ use a year.

“The Autopage system is more advanced than others on the market and they have developed it for us to suit the Carnival’s specific requirements,” Mr Hodgson said. “It works extremely well for us. Our primary need was to get messages out to officers quickly and the system does that and we don’t lose communication now.

“The support we have had from Autopage over the years has been excellent. They are very good on the research and development side. At times, I have been on the phone to them on the Sunday morning of the Carnival and they have helped iron out any little problems we have had.

“When we go to Autopage with our requirements, they always come up with a solution. They help give us peace of mind. They are very customer-focused.”