Displays and notifications in business environments

How do you go about complying with legislation that prescribes that certain information be prominantly displayed in your place of business? We tell you how to use the features of e-paper to make notice compliance simpler.

You can now have only one e-paper sign that will show all the information you are obliged to provide in the workplace in as many languages as you like, continuously rotating the language variants.

Whatever your industry or specific business – in other words, does not matter if you are running a small mom and pop store or operating a busy corporate office – there exist laws and regulations in your country that very likely demand that your company, among other, prominently displays certain official notices in your offices, stores and at other locations.

Official notices to be posted

Such official notices to be displayed in your place of business can be put up either for the benefit of your customer or your employees, and can range from various workplace safety rules that you and your employees have to adhere to, to different notices telling your customer what they need to know in order to make an informed decision about dealing with your company.

So how do you go about complying with this legislation in the most effective way? Let’s begin by breaking down what exactly you need to put up and why.

Employee rights in the workplace explained

Through displaying official notices in the common areas of the workplace such as break rooms or kitchens you are informing your workers of safety procedures, wage and hour laws, and other statutes and regulations that apply to their employment.

If you work in the United States, for example, your employer has to display information about minimum wage, overtime pay, work hours, medical leave, union membership rights and the procedure of filing a complaint, to name but a few. Depending on where you work there are several more posting requirements that vary from business to business. Based on your industry employee notices can also provide information on job safety and health protection, describe the rights of migrant and seasonal workers, and provide information on equality of employment.

Quite a lot of posters to put up, wouldn’t you say?

Information on employee labor rights in an office break room shown on e-paper.

Displaying information for the customer

We’ve already told you about having to provide your customer with food allergy or calorie information on the food items you serve. But these are not the only notices that your business might have to display for the benefit of the consumer.

Depending on where in the world you are located and what it is that you do, obligatory notices to be put up for the benefit your clients can range – to name but a few – from notifications on limitations of service (such as the restriction of selling cigarettes or alcohol to minors), to the grade your restaurant received from the Department of Health, the information on what your business is liable for and what not (after all, how else will you know who to blame when you check your coat at a club and it goes missing?) and notifications on what customers’ rights are as consumers and when dealing with your company. Do they get a receipt? A written estimate of the work to be done? Can they return the goods purchased? If they are driving in the back of your taxi, can they ask the driver to change the radio station and decide on which exact route to take?

E-paper digital sign showing consumer rights when dealing with a business.

Connected via Wi-Fi or another type of data connection, electronic paper notice boards can be updated quickly and at once, regardless of location and are always highly readable, even in direct sunlight.

Providing all this information and complying with different regulations that govern it is no walk in the park – and we haven’t even mentioned different public information posters that certain countries prescribe must be put up, such as for example the USA slavery and human trafficking public notice that must be displayed in all airports, emergency rooms, truck stops and roadside rest areas.

Hablas español and can you keep up with the legislation?

It’s clear to see that keeping on top of notices that a business needs to display is not for the weak of heart.

Now consider the fact that some of this relevant information has to be, in order to be fully understood by everyone, also provided in languages other than your own. Consider the fact that the laws and regulations governing these notices are likely to change and then change again. Are you multiplying the number of posters you will have to keep putting up in your head and looking for a big enough wall yet?

Handle notice requirements through electronic paper

An elegant way of avoiding the headache described above is electronic paper.

We already spoke about how e-paper is the way to go when providing people with relevant information: connected via Wi-Fi or another type of data connection, electronic paper notice boards can be updated quickly and at once, regardless of location and are always highly readable, even in direct sunlight (just in case you need to put up a notice outside, you know, at a truck stop or something), and can even be tiled together into larger screens. All in all, a great way of keeping up with what needs to be done notice-wise.

TURNING JAPANESE

So don’t fret if your labor legislation poster needs to be displayed in another language. Spanish? Portuguese? Japanese? All easily done on e-paper, with just a click of a button, no matter the number and location of all your posters. You can now have only one e-paper sign that will show all the information you are obliged to provide in the workplace in as many languages as you like, continuously rotating the language variants on screen and using extremely little energy in doing so. In other words: one electronic paper board replaces the dozens of posters you would otherwise have to put up for the benefit of your multi-lingual employees and customers.

Minimum wage and overtime information displayed in Spanish .

How about having to update the information on the e-paper posters because the legislation has changed? It can be done in a few moments, through your computer or smartphone, and you don’t need to manually update all the posters at all of your locations. Or maybe you need to take down an old notice and put up a new one, perhaps because of a new regulation or a consumer awareness campaign that is taking place? No problem: just change the content on your e-paper devices remotely, through your data connection.

Blending into the environment

All that, and we haven’t even mentioned that the battery of your e-notice will last for what seems to be forever. Even more: because e-paper uses almost as much energy as ordinary paper (that is to say, very little) the e-notice can be put up without pesky wires and the signage installed without any damage to your newly decorated office. E ink displays can be easily mounted on any surface with nothing more than a few velcro strips, blending with your business’ interior design seamlessly.

After all, just because the legislation is complicated to keep pace with, the solution of complying with it does not have to be.