A one-man job in an empty property
A self-employed electrician or plumber works alone in a client’s empty house — up a ladder, under a floor, near the consumer unit — with no one else on site to notice a problem.
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Construction & Trades
Lone worker protection for construction and trades.
Sole traders, subcontractors, site managers and plant operators regularly work on their own — a client’s empty property, a site after the crew’s knocked off, an early start in a quiet compound. Not A Lone Worker keeps a simple check on solo working so a fall or an incident with no one around doesn’t go unnoticed until the next morning.
Where it goes wrong
The risks of working a job solo
On a busy site there’s always someone about — it’s the solo hours, before and after, that catch people out. These are the situations UK trades and site teams plan for.
The last one to lock up
A site manager stays behind to do a security or handover walk once the crew has gone. It’s quiet, half-lit and full of trip hazards — and there’s no one left to raise the alarm.
An early start in the compound
A groundworker or plant operator is in the compound before anyone else arrives, moving machinery or prepping the site alone in the first hour of the day.
A fall with no one to see it
A subcontractor working at height or in an excavation slips or is struck. They might get to their phone — or they might be relying on someone realising they’ve gone quiet.
How NALW fits
Cover that suits how site and trades work runs
Each of those maps to something the platform already does — from a phone, with nothing to fit to a hard hat.
Scheduled check-ins through the day
A one-man job in an empty property: a check-in at set points in the day — by SMS, email or one-tap link — keeps confirming a sole trader is fine. Miss it and a grace window, nudge, then escalation take over, so a silent job gets noticed the same day.
Shifts that escalate when overdue
The last one to lock up: the manager texts START with an expected finish before the walk-round. If they don’t text DONE in time, the shift flags overdue and raises the escalation ladder — the safety net for exactly the moment they can’t call for help.
A one-tap alarm and HELP keyword
An early start in the compound: if something goes wrong around the machinery, a panic/SOS or a texted HELP raises an instant alert with the worker’s last-known location — no need to unlock and dial while it counts.
Zoe, then a call to a named contact
A fall with no one to see it: we don’t rely on a gadget to detect a fall — instead, a missed check triggers Zoe to phone, and if there’s no reassuring reply it escalates to a nominated contact. So even when a worker can’t reach their phone, someone is put onto it.
Start here
The features that matter most for site and trades
Automated Check-Ins
Welfare checks through the working day by SMS, email or the no-install link, with a grace window before escalation.
See check-insShifts & Locations
Clock a solo or out-of-hours shift on and off by text; overdue shifts auto-escalate — the catch-all for a fall.
See shifts & locationsPanic & SOS
A one-tap alarm and HELP keyword for an incident on site — instant alert with last-known location.
See panic & SOSA day in the life
What it looks like on a solo job
Illustrative scenario
Picture a small firm whose trades often work single-handed across different sites. Each one texts START with a rough finish time when they get to a job, and gets a check-in prompt partway through. The office can see on the Locations map where each person last checked in safe — nothing more, no live trail.
One fitter has a fall in an empty property and can’t get to their phone. Their check-in goes unanswered, the shift passes its expected finish, and Zoe’s call gets no reply — so the escalation ladder puts a colleague and a named contact onto it with the last-known location, hours before anyone would otherwise have wondered where they’d got to.
This is an illustration of how the pieces fit together, not a real client story — but every step in it is something the platform does today.
Further reading
More on keeping workers safe
Night shifts, empty sites: lone worker safety in security & facilities
Nights, empty buildings and long solo patrols define lone working in security and facilities. Here's how to keep those workers genuinely safe, not just monitored.
Lone worker risk assessment: a practical template walk-through
A lone worker risk assessment doesn't need to be a 40-page document. Here's a practical, section-by-section walk-through you can adapt for your own team.
BS 8484 and lone worker devices: what the standard covers (and what it doesn't)
BS 8484 comes up in almost every lone worker device conversation — often as a badge with little explanation. Here's what the British Standard actually addresses.