From pen and paper to a Pocket PC solution – what a difference! This offshore company came to us becuase they knew there was a better way. Instead of using pen and paper, they wanted to use a Pocket PC in the field to record measurements and quailty stats.
BACKGROUND
This company was tasked to lay pipes at the bottom of the ocean floor all over the world by different governments or companies. Ocean pipe laying is a 24 hour operation, 7 days a week, not for the faint of heart. The company used a custom Pocket PC program developed by AccessExperts.net to expedite the operation, provide electronic documentation to clients the same day and monitor vendor quality.
SITUATION
Pipes are inspected on the beach before being loaded onto a barge and shipped out to Sea where the construction barge is located. Before using our solution, the company was recording all data on pen and paper. Once the barge was loaded the Captain had to wait until all the data was entered into an Access database, (around 1.5 hours), printed as a manifest and sent to the Captain before he could cast off. There had to be a better way, and the company found it by turning to AccessExperts.
SOLUTION
Using rugged Pocket PC and an MSDE database on a laptop, QA inspectors can now inspect pipes and record the inspection results automatically. More time can now be used to inspect many more aspects of the pipe and provide clients with comprehensive reports on a daily basis. Pipe vendors are now evaluated over many projects to determine defects per thousand at least once a year.
SUMMARY
When your out at Sea working 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, you just can’t pick up the phone and ask for tech support. With a modern data collection system, this company has jumped years ahead of the competition and offered more to clients. At the end of the day they can now say, “We discovered the power of our data!”.