Cardinia Shire Council

The Council was looking for a more time and cost effective way to manage access, by staff, contractors and the public, explains the Council’s Rachel Zoldak: “We were using traditional locks and keys”, says the Client Services and Systems Senior Officer, whose role includes managing access to the Council’s buildings and facilities. “Every time a key was lost, we had the expense of replacing locks, replacing keys and getting the new keys to the users. With a shire the size of Cardinia, it can take an hour to drive to some of our sites. If a master key was lost, the headache was massive. We had to replace even more locks. We have 2500 across the shire, so it was a big issue.”

It wasn’t just lost keys that caused problems. “We have a number of buildings that need to be locked at night”, continues Rachel. “For those facilities, such as childcare centres and public toilets, it was important for us to find a solution that didn’t require physical locking and unlocking.”

Visibility of access is essential too: “Sites like sports centres are used by a wide range of groups, so we required a system to track keys, and data on how many people were occupying buildings and when".

Cardinia Shire heard about the Salto Electronic Access Control (EAC) system used by the nearby City of LaTrobe, and made the journey east to see it in operation. They were impressed with what they saw. They also knew that the system was helping to drive efficiencies at Bayside, Moonee Valley and Horsham councils. After the due tendering process, Cardinia selected a Salto mobile-based approach for their own 2500 locks.

“With the new system, the user’s mobile phone becomes the key”, explains Rachel. “We grant access through a central system and send the ‘key’ to the user’s phone. Access requires no travel and can be instant if required.” She continues: “The doors have an electronic lock that reads the access information from the phone. Because the locks need no wiring, they are really quick, easy and cost effective to install.”

(The council does offer users the option to have an electronic fob rather than use their phone, but strongly encourages the latter and aims to phase out fobs over time).

Although the rollout is still under way, it’s already proving its value. “All in all”, sums up Rachel, “the Salto system is so much more convenient for staff and users, it’s increased the security of valuable Council facilities and assets, it’s cost effective and it’s saving us an incredible amount of time. It was definitely a great decision".