Seasonal security on the islands: villas and holiday lets

• Season: guest changeovers, valuables in bedrooms, staff with keys, pool and garden contractors, terrace doors left open.
• Off-season: nobody sees the house, police and technicians may be far away, the owner is in another city or country.
• Both: who has a key or code today — the first question in every incident.

For a house that stands empty for months — openings, utilities, inspections — see the guide to vacant property security. Here we stay with what changes when the house fills and empties every week.

• Booking list: booking name, dates, number of guests, contact — from the owner or manager, not from the guest at the door.
• Codes: a new door or key-safe code for each stay, expiring at departure; never the same one all summer.
• Key register: how many copies exist, who holds which, when they came back.
• Arrival briefing: how to set the alarm, whom to call for help, where the safe is.
• Departure check: doors, windows, alarm, keys counted, damage photographed.

If a key is lost or a code leaks, it changes that same day — not at the end of the season.

• Where the guard works: gate, fence line, parking, outbuildings — not the terrace, pool or bedrooms.
• Contact: guests know from arrival who the guard is and how to call them; the guard does not turn up uninvited.
• Confidentiality: to anyone who asks — neighbour, driver, journalist — nobody confirms who is staying.
• Emergencies: a written rule on when the guard goes in (fire, an alarm showing danger, a call for help) and whom they inform.

How a guard behaves around guests — uniform or plain clothes, what to say and what not — is in the guide to discreet security.

Article 17 of Directive 1/2011 of the Hellenic Data Protection Authority covers hospitality units “in any form” — hotels, guesthouses, rented rooms. It allows cameras only where entry and exit are controlled, where cash is kept and at electromechanical plant, and forbids them in dining areas, in corridors to rooms and wherever guests may be watched, notably room entrances, toilets, pools, gyms and changing rooms.

• A home for you and your family: the DPA states that cameras recording exclusively your own private space fall outside data-protection law — but they may not capture the road, the pavement or neighbouring buildings, and any other use of the footage than handing it to the competent authorities after an incident brings the law into play.
• A house let to guests: the safe course is to apply the limits of article 17; if you are unsure how your own property is classed, take legal advice.
• Signs: clearly visible, before the camera’s range (art. 12).
• Retention: deleted within 15 working days at most if no incident occurs (art. 8).

Never a camera over the pool or inside the spaces you let. There, protection comes from locks, a safe and people — not from video.

• Regular staff: cleaning, garden, pool — name, days, areas they work in.
• Changeover day: the busiest day; who goes in, when they finish, who checks the house before the next arrival.
• Call-out contractors: electrician, plumber — announced by the owner or manager, with time in and out logged.
• Staff leaving: their code is cancelled that day and their key goes back on the register.

Cameras are not used to keep tabs on staff: the DPA states that CCTV may not be used to monitor or evaluate employees (art. 27, Law 4624/2019).

• Monitored alarm: how an alarm receiving centre works, and what happens before the police are called, in the guide to alarms and the police.
• Remote verification: cameras at the entrances let someone see what is happening before anyone is sent — its limits are in the guide to remote guarding.
• Visits: patrols at changing times, scanned at checkpoints so each visit is proven.
• Response: ask the provider who goes on site on the island, and put it in the contract.
• Report to the owner: after every visit, with photos, time and findings.

In a real incident — someone inside the house — the guard calls the police and the owner; the police handle the case. At OVIT, visits, incidents and reports are logged from the phone with time stamps, and the owner sees them in one live picture through the Guardly platform, wherever they are; a real person answers the operations desk. For your villa, request a proposal.