Project Background
Our client was an Australian IT specialist tasked by his brother to automate the latter’s service business: electricians and plumbers. Due to excessive paperwork and a sub-optimal workflow, tradies jobs weren’t meeting revenue expectations. Feeling overwhelmed, in February 2007 the client hired Sibers as their outsourcing provider.
Solution
Sibers multi-faceted solution automates a tradies service’s management and tracks all instruments and materials, whether in-facility or on a service car.
The solution works like this: an employee receives a job order via push notification on his mobile device. The job details are sent to him by email, and are also accessible within the system. If something happens and the employee can’t fulfill the order, a manager can, in a matter of seconds, drag and drop the job and reschedule. Everything is synchronized: for example, when a rescheduling occurs from a mobile device, it will immediately appear on the website. The same holds true for customers: using a mobile device, they can request changes that will appear on the worker’s schedule. Also, if a field specialist is free, the system can automatically assign a job that’s geographically convenient.
This solution’s primary upside is the transforming of paper notes into electronic data. By recording the input of a digital pen designed for a special digital paper form, a mobile application sends everything to the system, where it’s recognized and stored. Once there, it can be used for operations such as immediate invoicing, accounting, inventory tracking, and more. Of these, we consider inventory tracking to be the other “core feature”. The solution allows a user to create a link to a supplier’s catalog, automatically take stock-related notes, reorder items when they’re running low, and track the company’s materials inventory. Bar codes and special labels are also supported. Last but not least, when a job is finished, the compliance certificate is automatically completed, and could be registered and sent to the client.
Tech highlights
- ASP.NET AJAX
- WebForms
- Telerik, Telerik ASP.NET AJAX Controls
- ASP.NET Web API
- XHTML
- WebServices
- WCF – Window Comunication Foundation
- C#.NET
- JQuery
- DynaPDF, PdfSharp
- Asterisk, AMI
- Funambol, SyncML
- Microsoft SQL Server
- MySQL
Results
Originally developed as a solution for a single business, the platform we provided to our client turned into a business in itself. MoneyPen is now offered as a System as a Service (SaaS) to 200+ Australian service companies such as electricians and plumbers!
Sibers continues to support and enhance the system, and we’ve already started a second project for the client, this time focusing on beauty salon automation.
Customer Says
Our company has been developing software for over 10 years in Australia. We always hired local staff, but finding the right skills for short term projects was becoming more and more difficult, and time consuming. We looked to outsourcing as a way to access skilled professionals, within an established organisation with proven project management systems.
After trying several companies, all claiming to have the skills and experience we needed, we found that Sibers was a good fit with our needs. We knew we needed to pick a long term development partner and focus on building trust and communications to ensure success. We have found the Sibers team is always ready to listen and our team always works hard to deliver a great service. We look forward to working with Sibers for many years to come. Keep up the good work! (July 2008)
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