Episode 3: Onsite Inspection Challenges

Jane's company is facing a lawsuit from one of its customers over an onsite inspection. Jane and Joe consult to find resolutions to onsite inspection challenges.

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A dissatisfied customer filed a lawsuit against the organization based on the outcome of one of the onsite inspections performed by one of the organization's engineers. The organization's reputation was on the line. Furthermore, investigation into the customer's allegations revealed a few flaws in the way these onsite inspections were carried on. Further burden on the shoulders of Jane and her trusted advisor, Joe.

Onsite Inspection Challenges

Inaccurate Data

Jane informed Joe that she had doubts about how the onsite inspections were performed at the organization. First of all, inspection data was printed from the line-of-business application and taken on the road by an inspection engineer. Although the printout included details about the name of the customer, address, phone numbers and type of inspection to be performed, there was no guarantee that this data will be adequate or accurate enough to lead the engineer to the correct location of the inspection. The customer filing the lawsuit was complaining that the engineer had reported the inspection remarks at the wrong site. Apparently, the engineer performed the inspection on the customer's neighbor's house instead of his own. It was extremely difficult for the engineer to verify the location, as the whole area is still under development and no accurate house numbers were allocated at the time of the inspection.

When the engineer arrived at the inspection site, the customer was not present during the inspection, even though the engineer had contacted the customer requesting presence at the site at a set date and time. The line-of-business application does not include details of the appointments arranged between the two parties, as all of this occurs on paper outside the system.

Manual Data Entry

Once an onsite inspection is completed on paper, data needs to be fed back to the line-of-business application. This operation is done manually and is error-prone. There are circumstances where the engineer had missed one of the important inspection tasks at the site. That would imply that the engineer would have to revisit the site once again. That's lost money and time for both the customer, as well as the organization.

No proof or evidence of inspection

The process does not include collecting feedback or the consent of the customer. This implies that the customer can easily repudiate and claim that the inspection was not done properly.

No evidence is taken to prove the state of the inspection. Although the engineer is taking pictures of the site using her/his mobile phone, in the absence of the customer's consent, this is inadmissible proof in the court of law. The organization was lucky that only a single customer had filed a lawsuit against them under these circumstances.

Solution - SharperInspection

Mobile Inspection Application - Take your data with you

Joe performed some research and found that a viable solution should be able to provide the inspection data to the engineer while s/he is mobile. Providing details of the inspection as a checklist makes it easier for the inspector to perform her/his job to completion upon the first visit. Furthermore, the exact location of the site is shared on the inspector's device using GPS, helping the inspector optimize the route to the location. This helps reduce the data inaccuracy issues.

Joe found that SharperInspection is the right solution for the job, as it makes the data available for the inspector on a ragged mobile device that uses GPS for navigation. The exact location of the site, as well as the inspection tasks are at the inspector's fingertips.

When the inspection is complete, the inspector does not need to return to the office to manually enter the details, as the mobile device synchronizes the data with the line-of-business application over the wireless network, making the lives of the inspectors significantly easier.

Proof of inspection

Inspectors can take pictures tagged by the location, date and time of the inspection as proof of the inspection findings. This makes sure the customer is made aware of the results. The solution can also take the signature of the customer as consent of the findings. This resolves the repudiation challenges the organization is facing.

What happens if the device is lost or stolen?

Jane had one more concern. What would happen if the device was lost or stolen? Joe answered that these devices are managed by the organization's IT Infrastructure. The device can report its location whenever IT Operators send the request. In case of theft, the device may be remotely wiped in order to prevent sensitive data from ending up in the hands of unwanted resources.