With the COVID-19 pandemic preventing SSAIB from travelling the length and breadth of the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland this year, the leading UKAS-accredited certification body for the fire and security industries are embracing technology once again to bring an SSAIB Open Forum to the homes and offices of our 1850+ registered firms.
With our flagship Installer Forum at the BT Tower also missing from this year’s schedule, we have teamed up with the team at BT to present a virtual event on Microsoft Teams - on the morning of Friday October 16 - to ensure that firms are still able to keep up-to-date with the latest SSAIB and wider industry developments, despite the on-going coronavirus pandemic.
SSAIB’s field operations manager David Roscoe will provide a standards update, addressing some of the recent changes and those on the horizon, while presentations from BT Consumer and BT Openreach are also on the agenda – as the all IP programme continues to pick up pace, ahead of the planned 2025 switch over.
Starting at 9:30am with an introduction from SSAIB, the morning’s agenda will come to a close with a Q&A session. Attendees are encouraged to submit any questions in advance to [email protected], so that we can ensure that none are missed and we can answer as many as possible within the given time.
The full agenda is as follows:
9.30am: SSAIB Opening Address
9.40am: Standards update - Dave Roscoe
10.10am: BT Openreach update - Phil Laws
10.20am: BT Consumer update - Phil Cain
10.30am: Open Forum Q&A
11.00am: Close
SSAIB chief executive Alex Carmichael commented: “Given the current climate, it has not been possible to make the usual journeys we make to catch up with our registered firms face-to-face. We’ve essentially had our full meeting schedule for 2020 come to nought, but this online forum at least allows us to update all of our firms on everything at SSAIB and the wider industry.
“As many of you know, we had great success with remote audits throughout lockdown and over the summer and we’ve also used Microsoft Teams for management meetings and our recent Auditors’ Meeting. Therefore, bringing an SSAIB regional meeting of sorts into an online forum was a logical step for us and I’m delighted that it’s allowed us to continue our working relationship with BT – after we were unable to host our usual annual event at the BT Tower.”
Phil Cain of BT Consumer added: “BT have been working with SSAIB for nearly two years on the all IP transformation and we are delighted to be invited to join this online event to update on the progress. Although COVID-19 has meant the way we do things has changed - in many aspects - the all IP programme hasn’t been affected and the 2025 date for all BT customers to be using IP for communications remains, so we need to make sure everyone has a plan in place.”
Should you wish to register your place, please log-in to your Registered Firms’ Portal on the SSAIB website and input your details on the Events page. An invite with a link to the meeting will then be sent to you prior to the day of the Open Forum.
Alternatively, please email [email protected] or phone 0191 296 3242 and include your SSAIB registration number and the email address that you wish to access the Microsoft Teams meeting on.