EZMaxMobile From InterPro Helps Skookum Improve Customer Service, Ease Work Order Process

With new mobile asset management capabilities, Skookum is significantly improving both internal efficiency and customer data quality.

Non-Profit Skookum decided to use EZMaxMobile from InterPro to go paperless, improve data quality for its customers, and increase productivity for its technicians. With this new mobile solution for asset management capabilities, Skookum is significantly improving both internal efficiency and customer data quality.

mobile solution
Skookum machinery mechanic Stan Mosley performs work order on a compressor in the steam plant. He is using EZMaxMobile to view the work order information, asset data, and work history.

Scott Smith, site manager at Skookum, said, “Enterprise mobile solutions are notoriously difficult to deploy and many fail right out of the gate. InterPro did everything right when it came to building a mobile solution for IBM Maximo®, and the company’s support and leadership are outstanding. Because of the cost savings, we can pass on and better data quality we can demonstrate with EZMaxMobile, we are able to win and retain new customers.”

Last winter, the Skookum team completed over 10,000 service tickets across facilities, utilities, transportation, and environmental business lines for the U.S. Navy at the Naval Air Station Whidbey Island, WA and Naval Station Everett.

Skookum’s Objectives For EZMaxMobile Implementation:

  • Increase technician productivity
  • Improve data to technicians
  • Improve asset inventory and data quality for customers, reducing need for 3rd party inspections
  • Enable advanced capabilities including electronic forms, material catalog integration, and reliability support

The Results:

  • Major client-facing improvements – avoided ~ $1M cost if performed by 3rd party
  • Accurate inventory of 15K assets within 99% (not achieved before)
  • Accurate asset data and condition – enabling the client to make better lifecycle decisions for $3B plant value – aligned with ISO 55001 principles
  • All key asset data including Tech Notes integrated with Client CMMS via daily interface
  • Improve Maintenance productivity by over 10%
  • Fully paperless work order process – Techs manage all work aspects from an iPad without redundant steps, e.g. entered work hours go direct to payroll
  • Fully paperless material requisition process (3x faster than prior process) – uses an integrated eMarketplace – over 5M discounted parts across 20 primary vendors
  • Automatic alerts – building managers updated via auto-email on work status change, techs receive alerts when material received, all client reports automated
  • Growing technical library accessible from EZMaxMobile at building asset level

The Challenge:
Skookum is a nonprofit service provider who largely works in the federal sector, hiring people with qualifying disabilities for Total Facilities Management and Logistics Support Services. The company specializes in public works, fleet management, and warehousing & distribution for government and commercial customers.

The company was looking for a way to provide mobility to its technicians using the Maximo platform. According to Scott Smith, site manager at Skookum, “Technician mobility is the number one improvement game-changer for maintenance companies. For example, for our project we have 130 people, of which 100 are technicians in the field. Traditionally companies gave them paper and you may have 20 pieces of paper for a single work order (work order, job plan, material, inspections…). If you multiply that by 40,000 work orders a year, it is complete data chaos. Effective mobility can solve that problem.”

The Solution For Skookum:
Skookum chose Interpro’s EZMaxMobile in 2013 for their mobile solution which was expanded for this project at the Navy’s Whidbey Island — going live in 2017. The key criteria were that it needed to be (a) technician friendly b) tightly coupled with Maximo — didn’t want to re-invent processes, c) ability to extend where needed, and d) outstanding support.

According to Smith, Interpro’s EZMaxMobile is the best fit solution for companies looking for a proven, technician friendly, Maximo aligned and “easy” solution from both a setup and training standpoint.

Using this mobile solution, Skookum has realized important benefits on the major fronts that align with their objectives. According to Smith, “Field mobility has been a game-changer from both an internal productivity and external client perspective.”

mobile solution
Using EZMaxMobile, the Skookum team is able to view all details for this compressor work order including Tasks, Warranty, Description and other elements. The technician completes the work order and adds a note, time, and photo. An automatic alert goes to the building manager.

Increased productivity, meeting 10% improve goal. Leads and technicians at Skookum have moved from managing a sea of paper and routinely coming back to the office for work orders and purchase requests to having all key processes and information on an iPad. A good example of a productivity gain is an auto-email to the building manager when a work order is updated or completed – with 40,000 annual work orders this is a major time savings for Skookum and gives customers more accurate and timely information.

Savings that can be passed on directly to customers. With EZMaxMobile, Skookum technicians can proactively identify asset issues and resolve as a regular maintenance effort. With sometimes 15,000 assets to manage, this is a major endeavor and eliminates the need for a customer to bring in a third party to complete that task. Skookum estimates that this approach can save customers well over $1 million.

Improved data to technicians to improve maintenance quality and timeliness. Examples including asset age, condition, work history, material, and technical documents.

Provide quality data to customers, such as technician notes — sent automatically to the customer’s Maximo system via a daily interface. According to Smith, “Our customers really like this. We are providing them with significantly better asset data both from a quantity and quality perspective, and it is provided within one day, versus one or more weeks. This allows our clients to make better capital project decisions”

Material purchase requests process using EZMaxMobile and an eMarketplace is now fully paperless and about three times faster than the previous paper-based process. Quality control process is now instantaneous — from the time an inspector enters information into EZMaxMobile to viewing data in an analytics tool, all parties have real-time awareness of current order status and progress

“The bottom line is, if you are not doing effective mobility, your days as an operations and maintenance business are numbered. Business longevity is tied to effective mobility. InterPro has given us an extremely effective Maximo mobile solution that improves productivity for our technicians and provides significantly better data quality and savings for our customers,” said Smith.

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