Managing more than $1 billion worth of assets, the council is now using mobile devices to record asset information in the field, directly into its TechnologyOne Asset Management system. Council’s 150 field staff can now closeout customer requests and instantly provide information for customer service staff.
“As an organisation, we were focused on generating efficiencies and improving our productivity,” City of Launceston’s Manager Technical Services Shane Eberhardt said.
“One of the areas we needed to improve was our response time to customer requests. Everything was paper-based, and required a lot of double handling and manual data entry to get information into our system, which was very time consuming and not cost effective.
“With TechnologyOne’s work management solution we are now closing out customer requests much quicker. Previously we weren’t completing a lot of these because the administration process was too complex. Now the guys in the field can simply complete a work order, which automatically closes out a customer request.
With improved asset data and visibility of operational crew performance, the council’s next step is to use this information to better inform budgets.
“Mobility in the field is forcing our people to become more accountable for their time, and is giving them the tools to plan and carry out their job in a much more productive manner. It provides better visibility of work and enables us to capture more accurate data around job costing, which ultimately leads to a better understanding of asset lifecycle costing,” Mr Eberhardt said.
The implementation of mobile work management at City of Launceston follows the council’s go live with TechnologyOne eServices last year, moving its application and planning services online to provide the community with better access to processes and information.
TechnologyOne Executive Chairman Adrian Di Marco said City of Launceston has established itself as a leader in local government by using the latest mobile technologies to improve productivity.
"We've invested substantially in our Asset Management product over the last five years, knowing full well that asset intensive organisations can realise significant benefits through more sophisticated asset management. This is becoming more critical as local governments are pressured to do more with less budget,” Mr Di Marco said.
“City of Launceston has bought into a solution which adapts and evolves, positioning them well to harness the full value of smart mobile devices and other emerging technologies.