What are the benefits?

Reduced wait times. Vendors would typically wait for hours as every firearm was hand counted by the armory staff at the end of each day at the

IACP conference. With RFID, vendors can return to the armory with their firearms secured and expect a receipt within minutes.

Locating missing items. With RFID, the armory staff can locate firearms that were left at exhibits by vendors in the rare event that a vendor does not return to the armory with their entire list of registered firearms.

Real-time audits. The armory staff is able to walk the tradeshow floor to audit vendors, ensuring that firearms have not left the show floor during the conference.

Why Implement RFID?

IACP has been the largest law enforcement event of the year for over 100 years. As part of the conference’s ability to provide a showcase for vendors and manufacturers to exhibit firearms exclusively available for law enforcement, the conference provides an armory secured by local law enforcement.

At the end of each day, vendors will pack their firearms and return them to the armory tucked away in the back of the trade show floor. All of the firearms are inspected by the armory staff to ensure that no firearms are left on the show floor. With dozens of vendors, each showcasing up to a hundred firearms, this process can take several hours. The firearms are secured overnight, and in the morning, the process is repeated, every firearm is accounted for before sending the vendor back to the show floor.

The Resolution

Engaging with RFID allows IACP to perform their twice-daily firearms inspections, track chain of custody, and ensure accountability while avoiding creating additional overhead for armory officers.

IACP and SimplyRFiD worked together to implement a system to touch every firearm, twice a day, using RFID. When a vendor arrives to pick up their firearms in the mornings, the process takes only a few moments. Gun cases are opened as they would normally be, but rather than scanning individual firearms or performing a manual inspection, the RFID enabled handheld allows the armory officer to perform a complete serialized count of every firearm in seconds.

The initial intake of the firearms involves a manual inspection of each firearm by law enforcement, including recording serial numbers and ensuring the firing pins have been removed from display firearms. At this point, the officer zip-ties an RFID tag to the firearm’s trigger guard and moves on to the next item. The addition of RFID tags to the intake process does not add any additional time to the process; it simply replaces a barcode tag with an RFID enabled tag.

Once the firearms are tagged, the benefits of RFID are immediately apparent. The twice-daily check in and check out processes are streamlined, vendors are no longer stuck in long lines, and the registration process is mostly unaffected.

About SimplyRFiD

MAKING THE WORLD'S BEST INVENTORY SYSTEMS THAT ARE FAST, ACCURATE, AND SIMPLE.

SimplyRFiD is a software development company. We make the Wave inventory software that integrates with premier hardware and RFID tags and helps people implement a successful system.

About IACP

Shaping the Future of the Policing Profession.

The International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP), as the world’s largest and most influential professional association for police leaders, is committed to advancing the safety of communities worldwide.