An E-waste collection client was facing a serious challenge in managing their day to day operations pick up and drop off schedules. They had in house administration staff, drivers, and their customers making bookings. All of this information was captured on spreadsheets that weren’t centralised. So, there was no single source of truth at any given point in time, causing frequent mistakes by office staff, and drivers. In many instances, customer bookings were overlooked completely.
Our client realized they had a serious issue on their hands they needed to resolve before the negative impact on their business became irreversible. They knew they couldn’t resolve this alone. This is where our development team was able to deliver a bespoke platform that provided a full turn key solution.
Our Solution:
Following some key strategy meetings and gaining a full understanding of our client’s predicament, we identified three key elements that needed addressing.
The three key areas included the office staff, the drivers and the customers. So we developed two separate applications. First a web app for their office staff to use. We then developed a mobile application for their drivers to be able to use. And finally, the online portal form which allowed customers to schedule the e-waste pick up straight into the booking platform.
To address the single source of truth issue, we developed API’s that integrated all three platforms which synchronised the entire work flow of customer data. This addressed the clients need for synchronised new, in progress, and completed jobs.
From a strategic perspective, a Google Maps API was also developed so that the office could follow the progress of their drivers and add any new jobs in an area they were currently doing pickups or drop offs.
Given the complexity of the customer data being synchronised, it was a natural step to ensure the client had a full range of reports to run, so they could strategically measure their performance as a business.
The screen shots in this case study look at just a couple of the dashboard screens used by office staff and the mobile application interface for drivers.
Outcome
Following initial staff training, our client found that the improved quality of the information being collected from customer bookings, to driver pickups had a dramatic impact on their business efficiencies. The overall reduced mistakes previously experienced had been eliminated, and their ability to operate more strategically through the Google Maps API saw their business growth significantly improve.
The complexity and challenge of developing and integrating applications while adding Google Maps API’s could not be underestimated in this project. However, the end user experience was specifically designed to be exceptionally easy to follow which made staff training and user adoption a great success story.
It’s fair to say that an E-Waste business is not the only vertical industry this type of solution could be tailored for. If you are looking for a cost effective single source of truth in your business booking systems that streamlines office staff, mobile operators, and your customers, don’t hesitate to reach out for a strategy appointment.