The UK-based Fortel Group company, Nexus Security, has been industry-recognised by becoming a member of the standards-driven ACS Pacesetters’ scheme.
The Security Industry Authority (SIA) regulates the private security sector and manages Approved Contractor Scheme (ACS).
ACS accreditation provides a recognised hallmark of quality for all security companies with that status within the private security industry.
The ACS Pacesetters promotes the contract security companies that have excelled during their annual audit and is independent of the SIA and ACS scheme.
The Nexus Team is now going to be independently assessed yearly against the minimum level of achievement in respect of operational and performance standards, which ensures their standards are kept high.
There are currently 830 contract security guarding companies who have achieved ACS accreditation. However, the ACS Pacesetter places emphasis on the importance of the annual score, and allows buyers of security services to differentiate between them and makes the tender processes for end-users much simpler.
Nexus Security scored 108 points during the assessment process, which has placed them in the top 15% of all SIA ACS accredited security companies in the UK – equalling the equivalent of around just 125 organisations eligible to join.
Jot Engelbrecht managing director of Nexus said his company has now become a member of an ‘elite’ group.
He added: “We are of course thrilled to have become members of ACS Pacesetters and to have achieved the high scores needed for this. We set ourselves the objective to become members of such an elite group this year so are so pleased to have made it.
“We have worked hard over the past year to raise our score from 66 to 108 points, so have made a significant improvement on our standards and will of course continue to do so. We benchmark ourselves against the best in the business and so this puts us in good company.”
Lynda Moore from the ACS Pacesetters said “We are delighted to welcome Nexus Security to our membership and promote the security services that the company offers. It is a great achievement to increase the SIA ACS annual score by 42 points over the course of 12 months and we congratulate the Nexus team on their success”.
Earlier this year, Nexus Security picked up the accolade for Enterprise of the Year at The Signature Awards, based in Birmingham for developing a new app called Leaf.
The pioneering real-time app is transforming the industry standard for the creation of and reporting of onsite security patrols.
The digital patrol logs within Leaf replaces the need for manual time and date stamps from security staff patrols, with an electronic ‘tag’ as it is updated in real time and supported by photographic records.
The platform also provides full visibility of real time online patrols to controllers and mobile supervisors linked to site activity from more than 100 guided sites, with Managers receiving daily reports of all activity to identify and address any non-conformances.
The logs are also monitored centrally by Nexus’ 24 hour control room from Fortel Groups HQ in the West Midlands.
BACKGROUND
The ACS introduced a minimum level of achievement in respect of operational and performance standards for companies providing security services. The contractor is scored against 78 achievement indicators. These cover topics as diverse as staff training, financial management and the company’s health and safety policies.
Only organisations that meet these standards, and continue to do so when inspected annually, are awarded Approved Contractor status, and may advertise themselves as such. The ACS is a progressive quality standard. That means that the SIA continually raise the standard that companies must meet in order to be approved.
www.gov.uk/government/organisations/security-industry-authority