A silent duress button for the library desk, call the back office without raising your voice.
A silent trigger on every screen, answered by the colleagues nearby. No server hardware, it runs on a PC you already leave on. Works even when the internet is down. From A$299/year.
No credit card required for the trial. No additional hardware needed. No IT needed, as long as you have appropriate rights.
Closing time, one staff member on the floor, and a patron who won’t leave, or an escalating incident near the children’s area on a Saturday. Libraries de-escalate quietly by profession; the alert should be just as quiet.
What a library service desk deals with
Anyone can walk in, and should be able to
A library is one of the last genuinely open public buildings. That openness is the point of the service and it is also why staff meet a wider range of behaviour than almost any other front desk.
Staff are often alone in the stacks
Shelving, reader help and the children’s area take staff away from the desk and out of sight of each other. The person who needs help may be nowhere near the terminal they usually work at.
The friction is small and constant
A computer booking that has run out, an overdue charge, someone asked to leave at closing, a person sleeping in an armchair. Individually minor, and collectively the reason evening staff feel exposed.
Where libraries usually put it
- The main service and returns desk, including every position staffed at peak.
- The information or reference point, which is often the desk nearest the public PCs.
- The children’s and youth desk, usually staffed alone.
- The workroom and staff office, so there are responders off the floor.
- The local studies or archive room, where a staff member sits with one visitor at a time.
The evening shift is the one to design around. Work out who is genuinely in the building after five, and make sure their machines can receive as well as raise.
Three colours. Everyone understands them in one demo.
Green means ready
A small dot sits quietly in the corner of every screen. Staff know at a glance the system is live.
Red means help now
One click, hotkey or desk button, and a pop-up appears over whatever colleagues are working on, showing exactly where help is needed. No sound in the room. Nothing the visitor can see.
Orange means responding
The first colleague to respond is recorded, and the person who raised the alert sees their button turn orange. They know help is on the way before it arrives.
- Help is acknowledged. The moment a colleague responds, the person who raised the alert sees their button turn orange, they know help is coming before it arrives.
- No server hardware. Duress Alert runs on a Windows PC you already leave on, and alerts travel over your own network, so they keep working even when the internet is down.
- Easy to roll out. You install it yourself in about five minutes per computer, with the silent-install packages and a rollout guide included. Already a Duress Alert customer upgrading? We help you do it over a secure screen share.
Prefer something you can press without looking?
Add a physical button where it helps, from A$25 plus delivery. Unlike a hardwired button, Duress Alert warns you on screen the moment a button is unplugged, and confirms when it’s back, so you never discover a dead button during an emergency. And if a button ever fails, staff can still raise the alert from the screen, tray icon or hotkey.
A control you can evidence.
Council WHS duties extend to every branch, and library peak bodies name patron aggression as a growing hazard. A silent, drilled duress process fits both the duty and the culture. Duress Alert’s dated raise, respond, reset history is evidence you can table, not a policy on a shelf.
“Our receptionist hit the fixed button under the desk during a confrontation, and found out later it was broken. With Duress Alert she knows: if it’s green, we can see her.”
Sally Anderton, Legal Practice, VIC
Simple annual pricing
Team Safe
Group Safe
Corporate Safe
Multi Site Safe
Prices exclude GST. Local taxes are added where they apply.
Install and options
- One-off install A$99, includes training and 12 months of support.
- Optional physical desk button, from A$25 plus delivery. It warns you on screen the moment it is unplugged, so you never find a dead button in an emergency.
Start your free 21-day trial, covering up to 25 computers. Configure it and roll it out across your site, at no cost. The trial itself is free. If you go ahead afterwards, we can set it up with you for a one-off A$99. When you move from the trial to a full licence there is no extra effort, everything you have set up simply keeps running. No payment details to start, and you can cancel anytime.
Prices in AUD. In the UK, USA, Canada or Europe? See local pricing: UK, USA, Canada, Europe.
For your IT provider
Your IT person (or ours) can push Duress Alert to every computer automatically, silent-install MSIs generated by the server with your configuration baked in, central management of every setting, and support for shared/remote desktops (RDS) and Mac. Client-to-server traffic stays on your local network (default TCP 8001); only the server talks to the cloud, over HTTPS, for licensing and reporting. Have an IT team, multiple sites, or shared/remote desktops? See our IT deployment page, silent installs, central configuration and rollout at any scale.
Common questions.
It covers the fixed positions well: service desk, information point, workroom, children’s desk and the office. Be realistic that a librarian shelving in the stacks is not at a keyboard, so plan which positions matter and cover those properly.
You would not want to. The client goes on staff machines only, so a member of the public cannot raise an alert or see one.
That is usually the shift the library is buying it for. The alert reaches every staff machine on site, including the workroom and the office, which is where the other staff member on a quiet Saturday actually is.
Yes. Each branch alerts within its own network so help is local, and where branches are cloud connected the service manager can see incidents across all of them.
Yes. Work health and safety law requires employers to manage the risk of occupational violence wherever staff deal with the public. A duress alarm on every screen is a practical, demonstrable control, and Duress Alert’s dated alert log is the evidence you can table.
No. Duress Alert runs on the Windows and Mac computers you already have. An optional physical desk button can be added from A$25 where a tactile trigger helps.
Annual licensing starts from A$299 for up to 10 users, with Group, Corporate and Multi Site plans above that, plus a one-off A$99 install. Every plan includes a free 21-day trial.
The trial licence expires and alerting stops until a licence is applied. Nothing is charged automatically, and we hold no payment details from the trial.
Buy the licence in the Duress Alert cloud portal. If your server is cloud connected, which is the default, the licence updates itself at the server’s next check-in, and it checks in daily. For an offline installation, our team coordinates with you to apply the licence.
Whichever you prefer. You can run the silent installer yourself in about five minutes per computer, your own IT provider can do it, or we can do it with you as a one-off install service that includes training and 12 months of support.
Tell us about your site.
Tell us your team size and setting, and we’ll show you how Duress Alert works on your own desks and what a rollout looks like. We get back to you quickly.
Quiet backup for every branch.
Questions? +61 1300 366 911 (Australia).
