How do call center companies protect themselves from fires?
Fires can happen without warning. An electrical short circuit or a cigarette butt can destroy entire buildings and take lives.
Ta3heed Newsletter spoke with outsourcing company officials about the matter and how they take precautions to protect lives and company resources.
Reyad: There must be wide emergency corridors for ease of movement.
Saeed Reyad, a member of the Board of Directors of the Outsourcing Services Division at the IT Communications Association, said that call center companies are taking precautions against the risk of fires with a set of precautionary measures currently followed by all call centers in Egypt, most notably a number of employees receiving training courses in the field of civil defense and fire extinguishing systems, and how to quickly provide first aid to those suffering from suffocation.
Reyad added that the engineering design of the call centers takes into consideration the presence of wide emergency corridors between work stations, which allows for easy movement and mobility and avoids the occurrence of a stampede by its employees.
He stressed that most call center buildings are currently equipped with emergency stairs other than the basic ones, in addition to pre-determined assembly areas in the event of any fire and defining the functional roles of each person in dealing with crises and ensuring the work cycle continues.
He pointed out that the managements of companies that have obtained ISO and COPC certificates are keen, when any fires occur, to ensure the safety of their employees and transfer them to another location or work from home, to ensure the continuity of work without any interruption.
Abdel Aziz: International clients require that the service be provided on floors no higher than the third.
While Shaima Abdel Aziz, CEO of GoChat 247 for outsourcing services, confirmed that call center companies must take into account the occupational safety standards for employees in the face of the risk of fires, noting that some seek the help of specialized entities such as Bavaria to study the needs of the targeted work site and determine appropriate alternatives to hedge against any fire outbreak.
Abdel Aziz pointed out that large call center service companies have a specialized department known as facility management, part of whose responsibilities relate to determining employee safety standards in the event of any disasters. She added that it is always preferable to establish call centers on lower floors to ensure safe exit in the event of any uncontrollable variables.
She pointed out that international clients require local companies to provide services no higher than the second or third floors of the building at most.
For her part, Maggie Dowidar, former regional director of Intouch CX in Africa, said that the nature of call center services depends on many human elements, equipment and devices, which imposes the need to follow safety measures that protect lives and facilities from fires.
The facility must have approved safety certificates such as ISO 140001, in addition to the presence of safety tools and equipment and trained personnel to deal with emergency situations such as fires, and conducting courses for employees on methods of evacuating the building in the event of a fire.
ISO 14001 is the world’s most widely recognized standard for environmental management systems. It defines the best way to establish an effective environmental management system. It was developed to help organizations sustain their commercial success while taking environmental conservation into consideration.
She pointed out that most companies in Egypt have departments specialized in this matter, which she considers one of the important matters that all companies must pay attention to in order to preserve lives and company resources in general.
