Poor visitor management quietly drains productivity, elevates security and compliance risks, and erodes the guest experience - costs that compound across multi-tenant buildings. How guests are welcomed, registered, and tracked inside a building is more than just a formality. And if handled poorly, it creates hidden costs that add up over time. So what are the cardinal sins of visitor management?
When organizations think about operational efficiency, they usually look at energy costs, facility maintenance, or employee productivity. What often goes unnoticed is one of the simplest – yet most critical – aspects of building operations: visitor management.
How guests are welcomed, registered, and tracked inside a building is more than just a formality. It affects security, compliance, employee productivity, and even brand reputation. And if handled poorly, it creates hidden costs that add up over time. So what are the cardinal sins of visitor management?
Manual visitor registration looks simple at first glance – a receptionist writing down names, employees confirming meetings, or guests filling out paper forms. But multiply this by dozens of visitors per day across multiple tenants, and the hidden costs become clear: reception staff spend hours maintaining paper logs, employees are interrupted to confirm visitor access, losing focus on their actual work, and guests become frustrated before their meeting even starts.
This wasted time translates directly into lost productivity – and ultimately into higher operational costs for both building management and tenants.
Paper-based logs or ad-hoc processes create vulnerabilities, such as unauthorized access - without a robust verification process, anyone could walk in pretending to be a guest. No reliable audit trail - in the event of a security incident, it’s difficult – or impossible – to identify who was in the building at a specific time. With Visitors app you know who invited whom, to which areas they got access, and when they entered and left the building.
Let’s not forget about compliance issues. Many industries require accurate records of visitor access (GDPR, workplace safety). Incomplete or inaccurate logs put organizations at risk. And probably the most important: in emergencies such as evacuations, knowing exactly who is inside the building can save lives. Poor visitor management means facility managers and security teams are left guessing.
First impressions matter. For many guests, the reception desk is their first touchpoint with a company or building. If their experience is slow, confusing, or unwelcoming, it reflects poorly not only on the building management but also on the tenant they came to visit. Typical pain points of poor visitor management inclue:
Without digital visitor management, building managers lose valuable insights. How many guests enter daily, weekly, or monthly? When is reception busiest, and how many staff are needed? What about ESG reporting? Tracking visitor flows supports sustainability reporting and resource optimization. Paper logs simply don’t provide the data needed for smart decision-making.
The solution is clear - modernize visitor management with a digital system designed for today’s smart buildings, and here’s how:
Visitors by Signal OS is a digital visitor management platform that works on its own or as a module in the Signal OnSite building app, so tenants’ employees can invite guests directly from their mobile phones.
In the Visitors panel, admins can create visits and register guests with or without reception. Guests receive QR codes that act as temporary badges to auto check in, call elevators, and reach the correct destination floor. Reception can double-check arrivals, assist with directions, and print QR codes for access.
For tenant managers and building admins, Visitors centralizes operations: create visits, add visitors, edit employee profiles, and assign invitation privileges; define destinations for smooth routing; view data and previews of past and scheduled visits; and attach PDFs with visit/visitor details for context.
For employees using Signal OnSite, inviting a guest takes just a few taps. Email invitations include the QR, instructions, and directions; the host gets a push notification when the guest passes the gates; employees can review their past, current, and upcoming visits and use visitor categories like contractors or suppliers for further convenience.
Learn more! https://signalos.io/visitors
