We first met Antony and Linzi who are responsible for managing the servicing and maintenance department at Ateb Group in March 2018 when they were experiencing quite a tumultuous time with their existing systems and had to revert back to paper and spreadsheets to ensure they remained compliant.  

Fast forward to August 2019 and Ateb have now been using the Propeller Workforce Management and Compliance system for almost three months and we caught up with Linzi, who is Ateb’s Maintenance and Compliance Coordinator, to find out how she is finding the new system, ask if her life has gotten any easier and if they have now been able to ditch the paper and spreadsheets.

 

Hi Linzi, thanks for taking the time to speak to us today. Please could you tell us what was your previous solution prior to implementing Propeller?

Prior to implementing Propeller our compliance systems were gas in Open Housing and Total Mobile and all other areas were run on spreadsheet programmes.

Were you experiencing any specific problems?

We were experiencing major issues with the gas servicing in Open Housing as there seemed to be so much manual work that was required in terms of reporting, resetting the clock for the MOT style servicing and having to create reports to be able to work out which properties required appointment letters. We had to heavily depend on our ICT department to produce and maintain our reports to be able to access the data we required. We also had to heavily rely on cross checking everything against our spreadsheet which was our previous way of maintaining our servicing programme.

We got to a point where we were in a position that we had to revert back to using our spreadsheet and working on paper to ensure we remained compliant.

Can you tell us a little bit about the implementation of Propeller?

We started to work with Debbie, David and the team at Propeller at the beginning of 2019 but most of this time was scoping out our requirements. We started our on-boarding in May with a view to going live in June and to say I was very sceptical was an understatement. After working on project implementation for 3 years I didn’t expect everything to be as easy as it was.

Was there anything particularly noteworthy about the implementation?

The implementation experience was a positive experience overall. The team took an interest in our processes and were always more than willing to adapt the system to our business requirements. We had progress calls throughout the implementation and a project planner which was helpful to be able to follow. We were fully supported for our ‘go live’ date and our on-site training was excellent.

 

What has your experience been in working with Propeller?

Our experience working with propeller has been excellent. The Propeller team have provided a very professional but personal service to us as a business and they are always available. It is really nice to be able to speak to the team directly with any support queries and troubleshooting. Any problems we have faced have been looked into quickly and resolved quickly and with regards to system alterations and bespoke reports the operations team have been more than helpful in making sure the system is set up for us to achieve our aims and objectives.

Our mobile working Engineers like being able to contact the Propeller support team direct with any support needs which is also a great benefit to us.

 

I know its only been three months since you have been using the system but have you seen and benefits so far in terms of time saved, improved productivity etc.?

Well as I said, previously, we got to a point where we were in a position that we had to revert back to using our spreadsheet and working on paper to ensure we remained compliant and now we use digital certificates and forms and there is zero time spent on spreadsheets to report on compliance – we can see it, visually, on our compliance dashboard, anytime of day or night!

The compliance admin team are extremely complementary of the system. From generating bulk services and sending text messages or generating letters, to managing and reporting on compliance, this system has saved us so much time and effort. The system and mobile app are also really user friendly and good on the eye and both work extremely fast which is great from a user perspective.

Comparing how we felt before using Propeller, to now, we are literally poles apart!

I would certainly say that my life has been made a lot easier by implementing this system and we are looking forward to moving the rest of our compliance programmes into Propeller.

For more details , visit:

https://propellerpowered.co.uk/kpi-compliance/