Dalkia, now part of the MITIE Group plc, was Europe's leading energy services company, with 70,000 customers including industrial facilities, residential complexes and a range of public and commercial buildings. Its objective was to mobilise local resources and minimise client organisations' environmental impact while reducing fossil fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions.

Business Challenge

Dalkia approached Lightsout Computer Services for a field service management solution that would enable information to flow rapidly between their field-based workforce and office-based staff. It needed to resolve inherent issues and improve the efficiency of delivering according to highly complex service contracts with penalty-driven service-level agreements. It encompassed:

• more than 1,600 buildings across the UK
• 150,000 recorded assets
• 150,000 reactive callouts per annum
• 200,000 planned preventative maintenance visits
• 25,000 proactive works orders from field personnel
• more than 10,000 quotes
• 5,000 projects.

The business issues and requirements that the software application would need to resolve and live up to were equally extensive and included:

• recording, coordinating and managing all the aforementioned tasks and concerns, along with the associated workforce
• reducing elapsed time from, in some cases, weeks to hours
• helping to reduce the annual number of callouts
• reducing administration overheads and working towards a time-saving paperless system for each employee, to increase efficiency and transparency, and to improve the processes from instruction to invoicing
• providing a 24/7 helpdesk to serve management teams, 30 manned sites and 300 field engineers
• the provision of internal and external real-time information and communication facilities to improve customer service
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• providing access to up-to-date management information, helping to improve situation analysis, business decision-making, planning and profitability
• reducing human error and improve information accuracy
• interfacing with existing applications
• increasing ease of use
• complete avoidance of service delivery disruption throughout installation and implementation.

At the time, the existing systems, although semi-computerised, heavily relied on manual intervention and paper-based records.

Solution

Dalkia decided to use Corona software, created by Lightsout Computer Services, which links handheld devices to central office systems and enables real-time information flow and recording. It is web-based and has the ability to instantly capture and process written, pictorial and even GPS information, which can be viewed from anywhere 24 hours a day. Corona's flexibility meant that it could be configured to meet Dalkia's specific and often detailed business requirements.

Results

Dramatically speeding up information flow improved Dalkia's customer service, increased efficiency and reduced costs. This included:

• increased accuracy and effectiveness of planning and scheduling
• at the point of instruction, the controller instantly knows the location, experience and capability of each engineer
• onsite engineers having a vast amount of information at their fingertips which increased their onsite productivity
• engineers spending less time travelling
• a paperless system - each visit is fully recorded and captured in the central system
• clear and detailed visit records reducing the risk of client disputes
• improved service quality
• readily accessible information to support service level agreements
• increased business capacity
• the new system appealing to customers and prospects, which supported business growth

The entire business process and the people within it are optimised.

"To retain its leadership position, Dalkia continually evolves its technology's best practices to support its expanding operations. By incorporating automation, intelligence and real-time, two-way communication into our operations, we've been able to move to a much more proactive approach to service management," explained Dalkia Prime's project manager.

Business Benefits

• 10% increase in capacity without hiring more engineers
• 3% rise in operational efficiency and productivity across the board
• 10% reduction in operational costs and administrative overheads
• real-time information
• improved customer service