Abstract: A personal safety communications system includes a plurality of user terminals belonging to a plurality of individual users and being interconnected via one or more networks. The system includes an alert management apparatus, the apparatus includes a relationship database storing a set of dependant-guardian relationships among users of said user terminals such that one or more users can be designated as guardians of another user, including the possibility for users to be guardians of one another. The apparatus further includes an alert initiation interface by which a first user having one or more designated guardians can use their user terminal to initiate an alert situation and to indicate their location. The apparatus further includes a guardian response interface and a situation monitoring interface for informing the first user of the identity and location of one or more guardians who have indicated they will attend.