Most underperforming business CCTV we are asked to look at has the same history. Cameras went up where the cabling was easiest, nobody wrote down what each camera was for, and the first time the footage really mattered it was not good enough. Specifying a system properly is not complicated, but it has to happen in the right order. Here is what we work through with businesses across Northern Ireland.
Give every camera a job
Placement comes before products. Decide what each camera must achieve, then pick the position and lens that achieve it. Entrances and exits deserve identification shots at face height, close enough that a person fills a good portion of the frame. Tills, counters and offices where cash is handled come next, then loading bays, yards and anywhere plant, fuel or stock sits outside. Wider views across a car park or perimeter are for watching movement, not identifying people, and it is a mistake to expect one camera to do both. Two faults we correct constantly: cameras mounted so high they record the tops of heads, and cameras pointed at a bright doorway so everyone who walks in is a silhouette. Shoot into the building rather than out of it, or specify a camera with proper wide dynamic range.
Retention and GDPR
Footage of staff, customers and passers-by is personal data, and running CCTV at a business brings obligations. The basics: pay the ICO data protection fee, put up signage, name someone responsible for the system, keep recordings only as long as you have a reason to (around 31 days is typical), and be able to answer a subject access request when someone asks for footage of themselves. Keep coverage of neighbouring property and public footpaths to the minimum practical. There is a fuller walkthrough on our CCTV compliance page. When we specify a system, the retention period drives the storage calculation, rather than storage being whatever the recorder happened to ship with.
Monitored or recorded-only
Recorded-only CCTV tells you what happened. That is genuinely useful for disputes, shrinkage and incidents you review after the event, but overnight it does nothing until somebody watches the recording. A monitored system uses detection analytics to flag activity to an alarm receiving centre while it is happening. Operators verify the cause, challenge intruders over speakers where fitted, and escalate genuine incidents straight away. Signals from our monitored systems go to our own alarm receiving centre. Yards, forecourts, building sites and premises with stock or vehicles outside usually justify monitoring; a small office with nothing outdoors often does not, and we will say so at survey.
Keep cameras off the office network
IP cameras are computers, and cheap ones are poorly maintained computers. They belong on their own switch or VLAN, isolated from the network your business actually runs on, with default passwords changed and firmware kept current. Remote viewing should go through the secure service built into the recorder, not a port forwarded straight through your router. Ask any installer how they intend to handle this. A shrug is a useful warning.
What a proper survey covers
Expect the surveyor to walk the whole site, ask what problems you are trying to solve, and note lighting, ideally considering how the site looks after dark as well as in daylight. What you should get back: a coverage plan that states the purpose of every camera, a camera schedule, cable routes and the recorder location, a storage calculation built from your retention period and recording settings, the network arrangement, the compliance points above, and a written specification you can hold the installation to. If the survey is a quick look round and a figure on the spot, the footage will eventually show it.
Advanced Overwatch designs, installs, maintains and monitors business CCTV across Northern Ireland from our base in Coleraine. Advanced Overwatch is SSAIB certificated (NIRE127) specifically for Intruder Alarm Systems, Visual Surveillance Systems (VSS) and Access Control Systems. Call 028 7087 8077 to arrange a survey.