Know who left the office — without anyone swiping out.

Your access system can tell you who came in at 8:42. Ask it who is still in the building right now and it has no idea. That gap matters most at the worst moments: a fire alarm, a lock-up at night, an incident someone needs to reconstruct. GateStride closes it on the system you already own, and nobody has to tap a card to leave.

Why your system only knows half the story

Look at the inside of any office door with a card reader. On the way in, you present a badge and the system logs your name. On the way out, you push a bar, press a green button or simply walk up to the door while a motion sensor releases it. That release is called request-to-exit, and it exists for a good reason: life-safety rules generally require that people can leave without a key, card or special knowledge.

The side effect is that the access system sees “door opened from inside” with no name attached. Some buildings add a second reader on the inside so people “badge out”, but that only works if everyone remembers, nobody holds the door for a colleague, and nobody leaves through the stairwell or the loading dock. In practice, exit logs built on swipe-out are full of holes, and most small and mid-size offices don’t try.

What not knowing costs a small or mid-size office

Fire alarms and evacuations. When the alarm sounds, someone with a clipboard tries to work out who is missing from the car park. Visitors, contractors, people working from home that day and people who left early all confuse the count. Every minute spent guessing is a minute a warden might go back in for someone who is already at lunch — or not go back for someone who is still inside.

Lock-up and lone working. The last person out wants to know the office is empty before setting the alarm. Facilities wants to know who is working late on their own. Without exit data, both rely on walking the floor.

Incidents and disputes. A laptop goes missing, a door is found propped open, a client asks who had access to a room. An entry log tells you who arrived; it cannot tell you who was present at 6:15pm.

Attendance and hybrid office planning. First-in and last-out times answer simple questions about hours on site. Real occupancy — how many people are actually in the office on a Tuesday versus a Friday — is what you need before renewing a lease or deciding whether you need that extra floor. For a company renting commercial office space, rent is usually the biggest facility cost, so better occupancy data is worth having.

How GateStride records exits without a swipe

Staff carry an enrolled phone, watch or tablet. When they walk up to the door to come in, the node at the door verifies the device and unlocks through your existing panel. When they leave, they leave the way they always have — push bar, button or motion release — and the node notes the enrolled device going out. Nobody stops, nobody taps, and the door’s release path is untouched.

GateStride uses device credentials and non-biometric person detection by default. Facial recognition is optional, off by default, and offered only where it is legally compliant and you choose to enable it.

Real-time occupancy for your office

Because entries and exits are both recorded, GateStride keeps a live count of who is in the building, per site and per floor. Office managers use it to see whether today is a busy day, facilities teams use it to plan space, and the last person out can check the list before setting the alarm.

A fire drill with a roll call instead of a clipboard

1. The alarm sounds. People leave by the nearest exit, as your evacuation plan says. Nobody needs to badge out.
2. The warden opens the roll call. On a phone at the muster point, GateStride shows everyone who was inside when the alarm started.
3. People are marked safe. Exits recorded on the way out are already ticked; the warden confirms the rest by sight with one tap each.
4. The gaps are obvious. Whoever is still unaccounted for is at the top of the list, with the last door they used — information you can hand to the fire service.

Exit tracking supports accountability. It is not a substitute for free egress, your evacuation plan or your certified fire and life-safety systems. This page is general information, not life-safety or legal advice; requirements vary by jurisdiction, so confirm with your fire marshal or other authority having jurisdiction.

On the system you already have

You don’t need a new access-control platform to get this. GateStride overlays the system in your building today — Kantech EntraPass, Honeywell, LenelS2 OnGuard, Software House C•CURE, HID and Brivo among them — by reading its events and calling its own unlock. See the integrations, the architecture, and what the switch does to your running costs in the savings calculator.

Questions

Why doesn’t my card access system know who left?

Most offices let people out with a push bar, a request-to-exit button or a motion sensor, because life-safety rules generally require exits to open freely. The access system sees the door open but not who opened it, so it records entries only.

Do employees have to swipe or tap to leave?

No. The door releases exactly as it does today. GateStride records the exit from the enrolled phone, watch or tablet the person is carrying, without anyone stopping at the door.

Does GateStride change how the exit door releases?

No. Free egress, request-to-exit and fire release stay on your existing certified system. GateStride only reads events and records who passed; it is not in the path that lets people out.

What about people without a phone enrolled?

They still leave normally. They will not appear by name in the exit record, so keep them in your muster procedure as you do today.

Does exit tracking use face recognition?

Not by default. GateStride uses device credentials and non-biometric person detection. Facial recognition is optional, off by default, and offered only where it is legally compliant and the customer chooses to enable it.