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Steel workers will be taking a 50 per cent pay cut to help their employer stay afloat. As well as the cut, employees at the North Lincolnshire firm Caparo Merchant Bar will take an extended holiday over the festive period. Staff will return to work on January 3, 2012 after taking a longer break than usual and at half their usual wage. Workers are being supported by Community which is one of the largest trade unions for the steel industry in the region. The business benefits of an advanced Tensor Time & Attendance system are widespread. It combines rostering, job costing and fast Smart Card time management, while handling all major hours calculation methods. The likes of WinTAnet and WinTA Enterprise simply determine matters like overtime and working rules. It can accommodate different overtime rates, handle night shift working and will insert unpaid breaks if employees do not clock them. You can also use WinTA to ensure breaks are activated between set times.

Hundreds went on strike today (Wednesday, December 7) at an oil refinery and similar sites over working conditions. Construction workers took wildcat strikes and protests at locations in London, Cardiff, Glasgow, Hull, Lincolnshire, London, Manchester and Merseyside this morning. Union members when balloted had voted 80% in favour of strike action. Employers Balfour Beatty Engineering Services challenged the walkout and a re-ballot was ordered by the trade union. Glasgow saw protesters stood outside the headquarters of Balfour Beatty Engineering Services. WinTA Enterprise is Tensor's multi-user, networked, multi-site Time and Attendance, Fire Roll Call and security system intended for larger companies. It is a complete Time & Attendance system for 20 to 10,000-plus people. It features web enabled, mobile and wireless technology. Up to 2000 users can be stored on one clock, with extra scanners used for time and attendance, access control, job booking and job costing. Comprehensive user-definable working patterns, rosters and shifts, annualised hours and flexi patterns can be created with the software.  

A 39-year-old thief caused more than £25,000 damage after stealing just £700 worth of signalling cable, a court heard. Lee Vincent pleaded guilty to destroying signalling equipment belonging to Network Rail, stealing signalling cable and going equipped for theft on the Brecon Mountain Railway. Fortunately for Welsh passengers no rail services were disrupted as the signalling works were not connected at the time. Vincent was released on bail until receiving sentence on December 15. Recent advances in technology have revolutionised the security sector and, in particular, the methods available to monitor movement and access within a specific area. Businesses investing in a Tensor Digital CCTV system will find it works extremely well as a standalone system, and it can also be fully integrated with previously installed Tensor access control or visitor monitoring equipment to provide a security network that is top notch. The CCTV footage generated by your camera network is recorded on a dedicated digital video recorder, which can be located either onsite or offsite.  

A man was warned he faces a custodial sentence after he admitted stealing signalling cable over a rail track, a court heard. Prosecutor Claire Fear said the offences took place on January 27, when Lee Vincent used bolt croppers to steal £785 worth of cable from the line belonging to Network Rail. She said around £25,665 damage was caused to cable under the Gaer Bridge in Wales. Mr Vincent will be sentenced next month. Tensor Access is a door access control system based on smart cards which can also include digital CCTV, barriers and other security technology. When a person attempts to pass through an access point, the T32xx access control unit compares the individual’s security profile with that of the access point. Security profiles are based upon the day, time of day, and the security threat level of the attempted access. An individual's security profile is based upon their access group. People are assigned to an access group, either unique to them or common to their department or status.  

A Conservative Member of Parliament has hit out at councils delaying deducting a day's pay from striking workers until the New Year. Aberconwy MP Guto Bebb said Gwynedd and Conwy councils had acquiesced to unions in going along with the ‘strike now, pay later’ arrangement. Mr Bebb claimed Gwynedd was due to make the pay adjustments in February. Gwynedd council would not comment before staff had been informed while Conwy said its payroll system meant it had to make deductions in January. Web enabled, mobile and wireless technology backs Tensor’s Time & Attendance payroll systems for those employing 20 people up to 10,000-plus staff. WinTAnet is a proactive clocking system that keeps your supervisors or management abreast of events. It does this by automatically emailing or SMS text messaging both employees and system users. With speakers attached to a PC or to Tensor's audio distribution network, spoken alerts are heard in a variety of voices and on screen ‘agents’ (similar to the Microsoft paperclip).

Suspected criminals openly dealing in black market scrap and outlining their techniques in evading the police are just some practices which have been exposed. British Transport Police (BTP) co-operated with the BBC in an undercover deal involving stolen BT cable. Det Sgt Chris Hearne from BTP commented on when a buyer wanted BT details erased on the cable: “The fact he wants you to get rid of identification to me is showing he is acting in an inappropriate manner that is bordering on being criminal.” Large exterior locations such as yards and depots are difficult to monitor and keep secure from theft. Tensor’s range of high quality, durable gates offer reliable performance in the most demanding environments. Ideal for controlling vehicle access to and from your site, Tensor’s gates are quick to respond to the user’s instructions. Along with car park barriers and CCTV surveillance cameras, this is the number one solution for controlling vehicle access to your site’s road entry points.  

A prisoner who fled jail was given a lenient sentence because he gave himself up after a short period. When asked why he absconded, the defendant’s solicitor Lloyd Jenkins said that Peter Wildsmith was “very worried about his release in October. He says it is a vicious circle because every time he is released he has no accommodation or support and he commits crime again.” The judge passed a consecutive sentence of two months for the escape from Leyhill Prison near Gloucester. Tensor’s PC-controlled visitor monitoring system has been extended to improve security in the HM Prison Service. Pre-booking of legal representatives, contractors and inmate visitors can be entered into the system at any time, and cross-checked when the visitor actually arrives at the prison. The visitor monitoring software allows any HM Prison Service officer to quickly check the identity and monitor the movements of visitors. Accurate records of any visitors to the prison are stored within the monitoring software, and can instantly be produced.  

The general secretary of the National Union of Teachers is hopeful the deadlock would be broken over pensions for teachers and other public servants by the time Christmas arrives. Christine Blower was commenting on the current dispute surrounding the new Local Government Pension Scheme which is due to be introduced in 2014. Ms Blower said she was negotiating with the officials at the Department for Education. “I always go in in an optimistic frame of mind,” she said. Tensor supplies web enabled Time & Attendance technology incorporating smart cards, including support for iClass and MiFare cards. Absenteeism and lateness reporting with email notifications or alerts and comprehensive user-definable working patterns, rosters, and shifts are just some of the advanced features of the WinTA system software. Annualised hours and flexi patterns can be created, monitored and analysed. The Export to Payroll function allows data from WinTAnet to communicate with all the major payroll such as Sage, Pegasus, Centrefile, Unipay and many more.

A distraught owner of a local butcher’s shop reacted to thieves robbing £2,000 worth of Christmas orders. Julie Smith said the South Wales business had only been open six months, and added: “It’s really hard to see someone has destroyed your business.” As well as turkeys, the criminals also stole kids’ Christmas presents. “All the money we had is gone to give the boys a good Christmas. They have just taken everything – there's nothing left,” she said. From the control of a single internal door through to a fully computerised, multi-site network of control points, a Tensor Access System is the solution for businesses. Most standard types of internal and external electronic and magnetic door releases and devices can be controlled, including barriers making full use of location points, whether in full view or hidden out of sight. People are assigned to an access group, either unique to them or common to their department or status. Access groups include separate rules for shutdown days.  

It is feared that a massive fire at a business park which was raging today (Thursday, December 22) may not be totally extinguished until Christmas. Firefighters tackling the blaze in Lancashire have now contained the flames to one building, the fire service has announced. Officials are narrowing down where the fire could have broken out. Fire service official Paul Richardson said one of the buildings involved had been storing toilet paper, a “ready-made fuel for fire”. Tensor’s security and attendance products have staff safety in mind because they can be integrated with fire roll call software that will automatically generate a report in the event of a fire or other emergency. As employees assemble at their fire roll call points, they use their smart cards or key fobs to record their presence. If employees have not brought their cards or fobs with them, they can be checked off manually using the generated reports. The fire roll call function is executed directly from the clocking stations.  

Schools have had to spend nearly £100,000 on fences to stop vandalism. The fences and gates will be put up at seven schools where it is felt “enhanced security measures are necessary”. Swansea Council has asked central Welsh Government to fund the work, although it is more likely it will receive a maximum grant of £60,000. The incidents of vandalism have included lead ripped from roofs, damage to play equipment and smashed windows. Among the access control products offered by security experts Tensor is a Visitor Management System (VMS) which uses the latest PC technology. Companies that do not have a front desk receptionist can take advantage of the VMS Unmanned Reception Console. This console is operated via touch screen technology only, so no mouse or keyboard is needed. Visitors with appointments can book themselves in and out and the back office can contact their host upon their arrival. This can be done manually or the host can be automatically notified by email.  

London Underground (LU) has said it will not appeal against a judge’s decision, which means a Tube strike will proceed on Boxing Day. LU’s bid to halt the 24-hour walkout by drivers failed in court. LU’s management said they would not resort to the Court of Appeal to try to overturn the decision. Lawyers for LU had argued that the strike had a “false mandate” by extending the ballot to those people who were not rostered to work on the bank holiday. All facets of shifts, rostering and hours at work are dealt with by an automated Tensor Time and Attendance system. Our sophisticated software handles all major hours calculation methods, as well as job costing, absence planning and entitlement management. Workers paid on an annual contract basis can be handled by the annualised hours procedures and reports within the WinTA network. Settings are included to separate ‘worked time’ into different overtime rates, night shift working, unpaid and paid breaks, and more.