Making mobile engineers more efficient in the “new normal”

Who planned for a crisis like this to hit?  And who knew it could happen so fast?

In the new normal, companies employing mobile engineers cannot afford a reduction in engineer productivity.  The harsh reality is that the status quo will result in just that.

Some estimates show that wasted time for a typical mobile engineer has doubled in coping with the current restrictions on their working day.

Why is engineer productivity so relevant?

Let’s look at the fundamental of mobile engineer operations.  The service provided is essentially labour.  For a typical buy/sell enterprise, this is cost of goods sold.  By reducing the cost of goods sold, or labour cost, you have to do more for less.  There is one issue.  Negotiating labour rates is even harder than negotiating price on product.  That leaves one option.  If an engineer can be more productive, thereby spending more time earning money for the company on sites undertaking work, rather than wasting time and fuel on some of the most common ‘wastes’ in the FM sector which I will explain below, the yield for company increases per engineer resulting in more profit.

What is there more to know about productivity?

For years, we have been using technology (and rightly so), new systems and looking at processes to improve productivity, but these are simply incremental changes and don’t change the behaviour of the supplier who supplies you the materials.  A real simple way to look at how productivity can be improved is to look at a simple engineer’s day and month:

• How long does the engineer spend travelling and collecting materials?
• How many failed visits does an engineer have every month?
• Do engineers ask for product X but receive product Y due to miscommunication
• How much is spent on supplier carriage charges?
• Do you have to chase for deliveries of special items, or even standard items?
• How many parcels of materials go missing in vans or on sites?
• Do your engineers get complete deliveries or can they often only do half a job?
• How big does your office admin team have to be to cope with supplier management?

By analysing this, it is quite feasible to suggest that savings of up to £5,000 per engineer can be achieved.

How can savings of over £5,000 be achieved per engineer?

Firstly, it can’t be done on your own.  Technology alone doesn’t change supplier behaviour much.  It may give you data but it struggles to change performance.  Instead, you need your materials delivered in such a way that the correct materials are delivered to the right place just in time.  This is even more necessary with the supply issues currently in the market.  RLT Onsite is a distributor of lighting, electrical and compliance materials direct to the mobile engineer sector.  We do this through the simplyonsite distribution system using tools such as the SOS app and reporting tools to ensure you stay in control but dramatically reduce admin and improve productivity.

With recent client consultations, we have been able to improve engineer productivity by up to 20%, saving some in excess of £100,000 in labour costs.

The simplyonsite system is totally free of charge.  You just pay for the materials!

Why not have a FREE consultation with one of our senior advisors on improving productivity for mobile engineers?  In the current climate, we also have a rapid mobilisation taskforce set up for companies that require urgent supplies via the simplyonsite system.  Contact us on email; sales@rltgroup.co.uk or call on 0151 480 4000.