BOOK ON

Verified vendor

Rota, attendance, compliance records and billing for UK security guarding companies.

Starting price: From £2.95 / worked officer / month
Free trial: First partial calendar month free, no credit card required; the next complete calendar month is the first chargeable one
Made in: United Kingdom

Visit BOOK ON

Overview

BOOK ON is workforce management software for UK security guarding companies, made by BookOn Solutions in Basildon, Essex. It takes a guarding firm from the rota through officer attendance and licence records to timesheets, payroll and client invoices, with an iOS and Android app for the officers on site. The vendor also addresses cleaning, construction, events, care and other shift-based sectors. It is sold as one subscription priced per officer who worked in the month.

Our take

The buyer is a UK guarding contractor still running its rota in a spreadsheet and chasing licence renewals by phone. Because the rate follows deployed headcount, a quiet month costs less and adding a controller costs nothing, which suits a firm whose officer count swings with its contracts. Pick it if your work turns on SIA-licensed posts covered around the clock. It is the wrong tool for a project team planning people against projects and budgets, which is better served by a general resource planner in this category.

Key Facts

Category	Resource Planning Shift Scheduling
Starting price	From £2.95 / worked officer / month One rate with all platform features included. Each officer who worked at least one shift in the calendar month is counted once; controllers, managers and office users are not counted. No VAT is added while the vendor is not VAT registered.
Free trial	First partial calendar month free, no credit card required; the next complete calendar month is the first chargeable one
Made in	United Kingdom

Features

Resource planning: Yes, shifts assigned to employees or subcontractor officers by client and site, a client roster and an officer roster over the same shifts, counters for unassigned and unconfirmed shifts, and a cover search by postcode and radius filtered by licence type, vetting status, certificates, work permit and transport
Task planning: Shift-based: each shift is set by client, site, day and start and end time, added one by one, imported from Excel or repeated with Copy Shifts and Copy Roster, and confirmed shifts appear in the officer app
Time tracking: Yes, book on and book off from the officer app with time and position recorded against the rostered shift, or by the control room from the roster; those records become the timesheet, with planned hours shown next to hours worked
Reporting and controlling: Yes, 70 reports in 13 families exported as Excel, CSV and PDF, client reports on attendance, calls, patrols and invoices, and a finance dashboard with revenue, cost, profit and margin
Shift planning and templates: Shifts added per client, site and day with start and end times; Copy Roster carries a whole week forward and Copy Shifts repeats a pattern across days, and an existing rota can be imported from Excel
Shift swaps and open shifts: Counters show unassigned and unconfirmed shifts; the planner fills them through the Near By Officers search by postcode and radius, and a no-show shift is reassigned to a replacement and confirmed
Availability and time off: Leave requests are queued for HR with the number of days and whether they are paid, then approved or rejected; leave policies are applied per employee with a simultaneous-leave limit and carry-over setting, approved leave is visible when the roster is built, and unplanned absence is recorded on an Absentees screen
Labour cost and forecasting: Each shift carries its pay rate and charge rate, Change Rate sets night, weekend or bank holiday rates for one shift, planned hours sit next to actual hours, and a finance dashboard shows revenue, cost, profit and margin by contract
Breaks, overtime and labour rules: A seven-day consecutive-work alert on the manager dashboard lists officers who have worked every day of the past week, the officer roster flags double-booking and rest-period problems, and the vendor lists overtime detection and cost alerts
Payroll export and integration: Payroll is generated in BOOK ON Accounts from approved shifts for a chosen period and frequency, with payslips; statutory calculations and HMRC submissions stay with your payroll software or bureau, and how the output is passed to them is agreed during onboarding
Team messaging and notifications: Confirmed shifts appear in the officer app, which also carries employer notifications and a news feed; the control room works with handover tickets
Platforms and mobile app: Officer app for iOS and Android, free on the App Store and Google Play, which needs a connection to send a book-on, check call or report; the office side runs as a cloud web platform
Integrations and API: Excel import for existing rotas; exports to accounting and payroll packages are confirmed during onboarding for the packages a firm uses

Integrations

Integrations coming soon.

Deployment and Support

Deployment: Cloud (SaaS)
Browser-based
Support: Phone
Email helpdesk
Onboarding: Guided onboarding

Pros and Cons

Strengths

One published rate of £2.95 per worked officer, with all platform features included
Controllers, managers and office users are not counted towards the bill
Approved shifts feed timesheets, payroll and client invoices from the same record
SIA licence, BS 7858 vetting and right-to-work records held against each officer
Officer app for iOS and Android for booking on, check calls, patrols and incident reports

Limitations

Licensing and vetting records are built around UK security rules (SIA, BS 7858, ACS)
Exports to accounting and payroll packages are confirmed per package during onboarding rather than listed
Minimums, setup and contract length are set in each company's commercial agreement, not on the pricing page
The vendor states its records support SIA, ACS, BS 7858 and ISO work but do not award certification or guarantee compliance

Pricing

Subscription

£2.95

Per qualifying worked officer per month, with Operate, Compliance and Accounts included and no feature tiers. Subcontractor billing is subject to client approval.

Alternatives and Comparisons

Last verified: 2026-11-04

Ready to take a closer look at BOOK ON

The link goes straight to the vendor. Some links on this site are affiliate links.