Energy producers and their service providers know that worker and asset visibility is critical to the smooth and efficient running of their operations. Traditionally, the lack of visibility for lone workers (especially those in remote and hazardous conditions), has led to slow response times during emergency incidents—with the risk of minor injuries escalating into major emergencies.
As someone responsible for mobile workers, you are at risk whenever they work alone—especially in the hazardous environments common to the oil and gas sector. Without real-time visibility into these workers, you risk your credibility, your company’s safety reputation, and of course the worker’s wellbeing. How much risk is too much?
Case Study: Troyer Ventures
Troyer Ventures is a successfully company that was in danger of becoming a victim of its own success. It couldn’t take on more business without substantive change to its operations. This lack of operational integration effectively capped the company with a revenue ceiling. The effects of this ceiling were most pronounced in the areas of productivity, accountability, and safety.
In June 2012, Troyer Ventures and Webtech Wireless jointly won the BCTIA (British Columbia Technology Industry Association) Impact Award in the category, Adoption of Technology.
Stymied Productivity
Typically, fleets are saddled with mountains of paperwork and horrible redundancies. Drivers must manually complete paper driver logs that are then manually re-entered or scanned by Dispatch and a similar process is followed again to invoice clients.
Time-consuming Regulations
As part of the paper jam, managing driver logbooks (especially the complex oil and gas Hours of Service regulations) also includes enforcing logbook compliance to ensure Troyer Ventures’ credibility, accountability, and due diligence.
Dangerous Working Conditions
Trucking fleets are inherently dangerous and the oil and gas sector multiplies these dangers. Add to that, the dangers of extreme winter conditions common to northern BC and the need for safety becomes paramount.
Together the inefficiencies, compliance difficulties, and safety risks were restricting the company’s ability to grow its operations—even with increasing demand for its services.
Solution
Troyer took the unprecedented initiative (for its industry) of adopting a challenging integration, which combined the best of three different software providers: TMW, Great Plains, and Webtech Wireless. From TMW it implemented its TMWSuite to manage order entry, load-booking, and day-to-day fleet operations; from Great Plains, it implemented its integrated accounting and invoicing solution; and from Webtech Wireless, it implemented its Quadrant® GPS/AVL fleet management solution with automated logbooks, fleet tracking, in-cab communication, and back-end integration to TMWSuite.
Replacing cell phones with Quadrant In-Cab MDT (mobile data terminal) units, which switch off automatically when moving, eliminates the option of drivers using cell phones while driving (dangerous and, increasingly in many jurisdictions, illegal due to the high accident rate from distracted drivers).
“Texting dispatch instructions directly to the MDT pad in the truck eliminates misunderstandings, provides safer and more efficient journey management, and also provides documented records of instructions given.”
—Steve Troyer, Troyer Ventures
