Your Obligations Under the HSWA
Working alone is common and entirely legal in New Zealand, but it comes with safety considerations you, as the employer, are responsible for managing. The Health and Safety at Work Act 2015 (HSWA) is the cornerstone of that responsibility. It requires businesses to carry out proper risk assessments for lone working situations, identify hazards before they cause harm, and put effective controls in place, including reliable communication.
Understanding "Reasonably Practicable"
The HSWA centres on one core idea: taking all steps that are reasonably practicable to manage risk. That means weighing the likelihood and severity of potential harm against the availability and cost of ways to address it. For lone workers, this responsibility carries extra weight, since isolation can turn a minor incident into a life-threatening emergency far faster than it would for someone with colleagues nearby.
Real-World Risks Across NZ Industries
The risks lone workers face vary enormously by role and environment.
- Agriculture: a farmer working alone in a back paddock with no mobile reception could suffer a medical event or machinery injury a long way from help.
- Healthcare: a district nurse could encounter an aggressive situation during a home visit with no immediate backup.
- Forestry: a surveyor working deep in remote forest could be injured with no way to call for help beyond radio or satellite range.
In every one of these cases, a reliable communication device and a clear emergency plan are fundamental to meeting your legal obligations, not optional extras.
How to Conduct a Lone Worker Risk Assessment
A risk assessment isn't a box-ticking exercise, it's a living process that identifies the real hazards your people face when working alone, and directly informs which devices you actually need.
Identifying Your Hazards
The most effective approach breaks risk down into three categories.
- Environmental risks: isolation, patchy or no mobile reception, extreme weather, poor lighting.
- Task-based risks: operating machinery solo, handling cash or valuables, long-distance driving on quiet rural roads.
- People-related risks: pre-existing medical conditions, inexperience in the role, potential for public aggression.
Evaluating and Prioritising
For each hazard, ask two questions: how likely is it, and how bad would it be if it happened? A fall from height at a remote site is high-likelihood and high-severity, and demands a robust response, such as a man-down alarm paired with satellite communication.
Choosing the Right Safety Devices for Your Team
Once your risk assessment identifies the dangers your team faces, it's time to match the technology to those specific risks. There's no one-size-fits-all answer, a real estate agent in urban Auckland has very different needs to a forestry crew in the Coromandel.
Active vs Passive Monitoring
A passive system relies on the worker remembering to call or message a supervisor at set intervals. An active system automates the check-in, GPS tracking and panic alarms, so if a worker fails to check in, an alert triggers automatically without anyone needing to notice the silence themselves. Active systems give far more assurance, since a rapid response doesn't depend on the worker being conscious and able to act.
| Device Type | Best For | Primary Limitation |
|---|---|---|
| Smartphone apps | Urban, low-risk roles with consistent mobile coverage | Reliant on phone battery and cellular coverage, not suitable for remote work |
| Dedicated lone worker alarms | High-risk roles across varied environments | Higher upfront cost than an app |
| Satellite messengers / PLBs | Remote or offshore work with no cellular signal | Requires a clear view of the sky, subscription costs apply |
| Two-way radios (PoC/DMR) | Teams needing instant group communication on-site | Range limited without repeaters, or a cellular network for PoC |
Key Features Worth Prioritising
Whichever category you land on, a few features are genuinely non-negotiable:
- Accurate GPS tracking: knowing your worker's exact location is the first step to a fast response.
- Long battery endurance: a device needs to last a full shift, or several days for remote work.
- Duress and panic alerts: a simple, discreet button to signal for immediate help.
- Automatic man-down detection: sensors that detect a sudden impact or lack of movement and call for help automatically, critical for anyone at risk of falls or medical events.
Don't just focus on the purchase price. The right device is an investment in your people's wellbeing, and the features that matter are the ones that make the difference when something actually goes wrong.
Matching the System to Your Industry
The device table above is a starting point, but the right choice usually comes down to the specific demands of your industry rather than a generic risk category.
Construction, Forestry and Agriculture
Rugged terrain far from reliable coverage, with real risks around falls, machinery, and medical emergencies with no easy way to call for help. Digital two-way radios with a built-in lone worker mode, automated check-ins and Man Down alerts, are the standard here, with satellite messengers for the most remote blocks or high-country stations.
Transport and Logistics
Long hours on the road through areas with patchy signal. In-vehicle radios or GPS trackers with duress buttons give a direct link to dispatch, often integrated with existing fleet management software for a single view of location, safety status, and team communication.
Community Healthcare and Real Estate
Mobile workers facing unpredictable social situations, the risk of aggression while visiting clients or properties alone, need discretion above all. A smartphone app or a small wearable panic button suits this role better, with silent alarms that alert a monitoring team without escalating a tense situation, and duress codes letting a worker signal trouble even while apparently cancelling an alarm under observation.
Alerts in any of these settings can route to in-house monitoring, supervisors within your own company, cost-effective for smaller teams working standard hours, or professional 24/7 monitoring through a dedicated response centre, better suited to larger organisations or round-the-clock operations.
Building Your Emergency Response Protocol
A panic button or satellite messenger is only half the solution. The real strength of a lone worker safety system comes down to the human element, the clear, calm, decisive actions your team takes when an alert triggers.
Check-In Procedures
Your check-in schedule should match the risk level of the role. A low-risk urban worker might check in at the start and end of the day. A high-risk role in a no-signal area needs a much stricter schedule, perhaps every couple of hours via a satellite device.
A Practical Escalation Pathway
- Immediate contact attempt: the monitor tries all available channels for a defined period, such as 2 to 5 minutes.
- Supervisor notification: if there's no response, the worker's direct supervisor is contacted for context, expected location, known medical conditions.
- Emergency response: if safety can't be confirmed, dispatch internal teams or contact emergency services with the worker's last known location.
Getting Genuine Buy-In From Your Team
Rolling out a safety programme isn't just about handing out devices, success depends on the people using them. Real buy-in starts when you explain the "why". When your team understands that check-ins and alarms are there to have their back, not to track their every move, they're far more likely to use the system properly.
Training That Builds Confidence
- Run practical drills covering realistic scenarios, a threatening situation during a site visit, a fall at a remote location.
- Practise activating and cancelling a duress alarm correctly, this builds trust in the system rather than fear of false alarms.
- Walk the team through the escalation process, so they know exactly what happens when they trigger an alert.
- Run a scheduled mock alert every few weeks, someone triggers a test alert on purpose, so you can see who responds, how fast, and whether the follow-up actually happens. It catches gaps before they matter for real.
- Repeat training whenever someone new joins the team, and again before seasonally busy or higher-risk periods, harvest, roading works, or storm season, when lone working often increases.
A worker who trusts their equipment and understands the response plan is a safer worker. Review your programme regularly, and ask your lone workers directly what's working and what isn't, since they're the best source of intelligence for improving it.
Getting the Right System in Place
Mobile Systems Limited is 100% New Zealand owned and based in Mount Maunganui, with over 25 years supplying and supporting communication devices for businesses managing lone worker risk across the country. We stock satellite messengers, PLBs, two-way radios and dedicated safety devices, and can help match the right solution to your team's actual risk profile rather than sell you the biggest feature list.
