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Why your visitor book fails an evacuation
The paper sign-in book at reception looks like an evacuation list. It is not one, and the ways it fails are predictable enough to name. Here they are, in the order they will bite you.
It is in the building you have just left
The book lives on the reception desk. In an evacuation that desk is behind you, possibly behind a fire door you are not going back through. The one artefact your roll-call depends on is the one you cannot reach. Wardens work around this by printing a copy each morning, which introduces a different problem: it is wrong by mid-morning.
It records arrivals, not departures
Almost nobody signs out. The book therefore over-counts, and the people it says are missing are mostly people who left. That is not a harmless error at an assembly point — it produces names to search for, and the instinct that follows is to send somebody back inside.
It does not contain contractors and staff
Staff are on a payroll list somewhere else. Contractors often go straight to the plant room. Delivery drivers sign nothing. The book covers the one group least likely to be lost and misses the groups most likely to be.
One book, several doors
People come in whichever entrance is nearest. A single book at the main reception knows about one of them. Multiply that by a second building or a yard and the count stops meaning anything at all.
It is unreadable at the moment you need it
Handwriting, in the rain, in the dark, read aloud by someone who is not calm. Even where the book is complete and current, it is a poor instrument for the job it is being asked to do.
And it shows every visitor the last one’s details
Not an evacuation problem, but worth saying in the same breath: an open book on a counter displays the name, company and often the phone number of everyone who signed in before. That is a privacy problem you are carrying for the sake of a list that does not work in an emergency either.
What replaces it
A sign-in that people complete themselves on a kiosk or their own phone, that records departures as well as arrivals, that covers every entrance and every type of person, and that puts the resulting list on the phone of whoever is running the assembly point. The evacuation list stops being something you maintain and becomes a by-product of something that happens anyway.
Frequently asked questions
Can we keep the book as a backup?▾
You can, and some sites do while they build confidence. Be clear which one is authoritative, though — two lists that disagree at an assembly point are worse than one that is right.
What about people who will not use a tablet?▾
They do not have to. A receptionist can sign someone in on their behalf, and a QR code lets a visitor use their own phone. The point is that the record is digital, not that the visitor touched a particular device.
Does a digital system work if the power is out?▾
The roll-call runs on a phone over mobile data, so it does not depend on the building’s power or wi-fi — which is exactly the circumstance a paper book is least available in.
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