With a remote warehouse working in Ipswich and the office admin back at the main warehouse in Felixstowe, with operational staff at both sites, traditional VHF and UHF Walkie Talkie warehouse radios had limitations. Expensive repeaters and the consideration of UK Ofcom commercial license was not an option due to costs of the mast and infrastructure, landlords permissions, radio repeaters and distances.
Everyone used their mobile phones and spoke less, leading to single focused working and the lack of critical engagement in both warehouse locations, internally and between the two towns.
This needed to change.
I introduced Zello Radios with longer battery life, calling groups and alerts allowing directors and managers to work from home, or on the move, listening in on operations. Managers and operatives could call at the press of a button, with everyone in the conversation.
This has improved productivity, safety and reduced the inconvenience of answering a call or dialing a number for operational conversations.
The costs
Using a budget data only SIM card, free software and £130 radios for desk workers, with a more rugged £80 walkie talkie option issued to warehouse staff, with just a PTT and channel selector.
Zello has no monthly subscription charges for it’s free plan, normally suitable for the same model as the example shown in this context.
You can buy POC radios on Amazon from thirty pounds to hundreds of pounds.
More accessible communications have lead to less hours for permanent staff being needed at the second warehouse and problems are picked up far earlier than when we had the monotony of dialing a number to speak to someone.
Added Benefits being digital radios.
You can load the Zello app on any mobile to turn any device with access to the internet via SIM or Wifi into a radio on your channel/s. You can even use a laptop or PC to monitor or join in!
The radios seen in the image have the facility to see the transmit log and play back any message received to digest a reference number, container number or see how long someone has been waiting for their reply.
The battery’s last longer and you can use Wifi if you have access across the whole site, else a SIM card is needed in each radio.
If you pop home, you can take the radio and still be part of the conversation and no-one needs know you are on the golf course!
When I am working away from home, my 7 year old has a £30 radio connected to the home WiFi. He can call me at the push of a button. I use my own radio with SIM card with me, else it knows the radio is off-line and clicks over to the Zello app on my phone. Having more than one channel, call groups and priority calling is a bonus of Zello.
Image above is my case with an analogue VHF/UHF radio, a digital VHF/UHF radio side by side and on the left, a digital UHF radio with two PTT buttons as it has UHF and Zello (POC) onboard.
If you would like to start using Internet Walkie Talkie radios in your warehouse, do make contact and I can point you in the right direction or come and set this up for you.