Can anyone share some real world experiences with lanyards...i have a client with 250 employees that wants to get lanyards and a ID badge/credential printer.
Does anyone print on both sides of the card for the dreaded "the id is flipped the wrong way"
Do you prefer horizontal or vertical badges?
Should you use the color of the lanyard or a color bar on the badge for department identification?
Printers: any recommendations?
Long term issues to be aware of?
The Zebra printers are good as well as the HID Fargo printers. The HID printers have a new print method where by the actual image is printed to a transfer film instead of directly do the card resulting in better image quality and longer lasting print as well. The layout of the badge is customer dependent. Some want it portrait and others landscape. Depends really on what they are trying to print. Some print on both sides. The second side is typically a PO box to mail the badge to if it is lost or lately I have seen customers print the ID on front and back that way not matter how the card is sitting it always shows the picture. As far as lanyards I always have the customer go to one of the ID websites. There are way too many options and would be less expensive for them to purchase. Also this puts the owness on them if they don't like them. Some companies have their name put on the lanyards and some don't due to security reasons just as they don't print their company name or logo on the card either. Using some type of color identifier is typical on the card. Difference between employee, visitor and contractor. Never seen a company use different colored lanyards though. The only real long term issue is printer maintenance. When you sell them a printer always include a cleaning kit. The kit will extend the life of the printer when used on a regular basis. One thing is for certain never show them the demo card that comes with the printer as that is nearly impossible to obtain.
The only thing I would add to Shannon's post is that from our experience I would avoid the Fargo HDP5000. We have to ship them back every 6 months to get them repaired and have had them replaced by HID under warranty 2 times for each of our two printers. They are used maybe 100 or so badges per week however. We actually use both portrait and landscape. Landscape is for contractors, portrait is for employees. Everything else as mentioned is preference. The only thing I would say is make sure lanyards are safe for the working environment. In a machine shop, like part of our campus, lanyards are simply not acceptable and instead we use the belt clip yoyo. It may be possible to spend extra on breakaway lanyards however.
Another reason not to buy the lanyards for your customer. Also with the HDP printers are you using the "Composite" cards because the regular cards will damage the printer as they tend to bend during the heating process.
Yeah. It is something we had worked with them on regularly during the first year. They had us adjust temperatures, use different cards, etc. All of which we buy from them through the corporate 1000 deal. They never really gave us an answer to what was happening last I checked. We just gave up and pay for them to repair them every 6 months or so when something goes wrong.
I know the first one we sold had similar issues but haven't had any since. Maybe just a bad batch of printers. Of course there are lots of other to choose from as well. We generally have great luck with the Zebras except you know have to be certified for the 9 series and possible even the 7 series.
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