Usherwood Blog | Usherwood Office Technology

Saving Time and Money With Improved Surveillance Systems

Written by Darrian Breedlove, Content Writer | Feb 15, 2023 9:22:06 PM

Imagine your company gets robbed or vandalized, costing thousands of dollars your business doesn’t have the room to spare.

Theft costs businesses up to $50 billion annually. According to Statistic Brain Research Institute, it’s reported that theft is one of the top crimes most responsible for businesses losing money. It’s hard to ensure your business is appropriately protected if you don’t have the time to check your surveillance systems 24/7. 

Don't Waste Precious Time and Money

Suppose something was stolen or illegal dumping took place on your company’s property. In that case, it’s tedious to sit and fast-forward through hours and hours of footage looking for only a few minutes or so of an incident. Sometimes even video footage can be so grainy that it’s hard to catch incidents in the frame, especially if your eyes are drooping due to spending too long staring at the screen. 

So how do you protect your business against theft and vandalism if you can’t catch everything your surveillance cameras capture without paying an arm and a leg for massive servers to store all the footage?

Let’s be honest; even when you do take the time to invest in a system that can be of help properly, it costs so much to maintain enough server storage to hold all the data. But you still want to make sure your company is secure. Luckily, new video and access systems are available to help you save time and money. At Usherwood Office Technology, we’ve had project and sales engineers design surveillance systems and products for five years. We’ve heard many clients’ grievances and what they’re looking for in terms of what would be the best for their businesses.

So how can new and improved surveillance systems help you save time and money, and why should you invest in them? Let’s explore.

How New Products are Making a Big Change

There are many different types of surveillance systems. Each business has different needs regarding security. If it’s a business such as a law firm or any typical office building, they most likely need general surveillance. If it’s a retail property, something with more visible cameras may be used to help deter suspicious persons before a crime can even occur. No matter the business, every company shares the similar goal of being able to properly supervise their property.

New video and access surveillance products are making waves by providing quicker, more efficient methods of security. 

One update in surveillance systems involves video analytics. Instead of having a camera system that tosses analytics back and forth between devices, it now just sums up all the stored data from the device and then simply uploads it to the server. No direct prompting or interference is necessary. All video and data are instantly fed to the server, ready for the user to log on and check for unusual activities.

User networks used to be fully utilized by cameras in the surveillance system, streaming all video back to the server 24/7 and taking up tons of storage. It doesn’t decide when an incident is occurring and when it should start recording. It catches anything and everything, taking up too much space and thus taking up your time by making you go through hours upon hours of footage for two minutes of an incident.

However, newer systems utilize hybrid cloud video security and move all data to the Cloud. Cameras are now allowed to make decisions about what is crucial to capture, not just capturing when any motion occurs. This means all data and videos are only sent to the server when events occur, not 24/7 movements, because servers are just data retention mechanisms. Now each individual camera is its own decision-maker.

Built-in analytics and AI are helpful for finding and processing particular events. Surveillance cameras can now specifically detect motion in narrowed areas of the video frame or zoom in on information, such as recognizing license plate numbers. With these features, even details such as the make and color of vehicles could be noted and alerted to. 

There are even environmental features such as alerts to allergens, mold, vaping, etc., now. How are factors like these analyzed? Believe it or not, there are sensors that keep track of air quality. They measure aspects of an area, such as humidity, motion, temperature, and pressure, by converting the physical quantity measured into electrical signals. The measured electrical signals are then amplified and reviewed. 

What use do these sorts of sensors have? They can help ensure everyone is in a safe environment and monitor humidity and temperature for the preservation of equipment or materials. With these sensors, you’ll receive real-time environment alerts, reduce threats and downtime by detecting possible risks early on, and you’ll be able to increase safety.

These Improvements to Security Systems Are Saving You Money

Saving money is just as important as saving time. 

New surveillance products are assisting companies with saving more money without having to sacrifice the value and quality of the system. In fact, with older surveillance systems, more storage for servers typically winds up having to be purchased to save all the data captured.

Luckily, new trends in the surveillance product industry are making things a lot simpler and manageable in terms of price. The air quality sensors, for example, reduce costs by detecting minor environmental issues and reporting them before they grow into more significant, expensive problems.

The Cloud has unlimited storage for saved clips and a 30+ day backup system. The cameras used in the hybrid cloud video system only require a single Ethernet cable to work and contain a whole year’s worth of onboard storage with no Digital Video Recorders, DVRS, or Network Video Recorders, NVRs, needed. The software utilizes modern user authentication and a browser-based user interface. No downloads or plugins are required. No more multi-part purchases for one security system are needed.

Suppose you are a retail business and find yourself the victim of shoplifting. In that case, one of these new surveillance systems could catch the crime committed, and business security system benefits could cover you. Even simply the display of cameras may be enough to deter shoplifters. You would also be saving money in terms of catching occurrences that could cost you if you fail to provide concrete evidence. Avoiding wrongful worker comp claims, fraudulent liability claims, and simply not having to replace a lower-quality surveillance system after it bites the dust saves your business more as well.

Increase the Value of Your Overall Experience

The long hours of fast-forwarding through video footage are over. The future of surveillance is here, and it is impressionable. These new shiny systems aren’t just for looks, they do the job, and they do it well. Now you can secure your company without having to spend much of your own valuable time, and you can rest easy and leave it up to the technology to do the brunt of the work. 

These new systems and their updates can improve your business surveillance, offering a solid solution to your troubles. Reducing time and expense for surveillance systems will improve the overall value of the systems and technology you rely on, as well as add more stability to your business. Your surveillance quality will improve, and less time will be used. You can now rest comfortably knowing the money you invested won’t go to waste and will do you more good than harm. 

We encourage you to research the best surveillance systems for your business and time. What is worth the investment in the end? If you have any questions or want to explore more of these surveillance system options, we are more than happy to assist you and your business with a great solution.