“Back in early 1998 the Technical Services Department decided that because of the changes and growth that were occurring within the Hospital it needed to examine its strengths and
weaknesses and how it was handling its maintenance activities. At that time all our
maintenance activities were paper based. This caused great difficulty in a number of areas for
example, job and asset tracking, work duplication, poor reporting facilities, inadequate craft
utilization, limited customer service and quality control. It was recognized that the system
we had would not be able to handle the continuing requirements of the hospital in an effective manner. Hence a change of focus was required and it was decided that computerization was the way forward.”

“One that would automate the existing paper based system. We had also decided that as improved customer service was one of our main objectives we would implement a help desk facility initially which could be up and running in a reasonably short period of time. This would be closely followed by implementation of the asset register and preventative maintenance schedules. We were looking for a system that would allow us to do this without too much difficulty.”

“We envisaged that a computerized system would allow greater management of work requests and associated personnel, speed up reaction times to work requests, improve the monitoring of preventative maintenance schedules and allow better access to, better use of and less duplication of data associated with maintenance. We also wanted to expand the channels of communication between the Technical Services Department and its customers, improve the effectiveness and efficiency in the administration of the daily operations of the Technical Services Department and provide an accurate method of costing maintenance requests resulting in better future budgetary planning.”

“As part of our research into available software packages we contacted other hospital
maintenance departments in the Republic of Ireland to see what systems they were using, if
any. One of these was Waterford Regional Hospital who had recently purchased the IMPACTxp system.” (Waterford Regional Hospital won the MEETA maintenance project award in 1998 in recognition of their project to install IMPACTxp to cover not only Waterford Regional but also 25 other hospitals and 150 Health Board buildings within the South Eastern Health Board Region).

“The IMPACTxp system was the one that best met our system requirements overall. The fact that it is a modular system meant that we were only required to purchase the modules that suited our needs but it can grow with us in the future if required. It was the most user-friendly and easily customized system we encountered. The Word mail merge work order printing facility meant that we could use our own work order template design instead of a standard system template. One feature of the IMPACTxp system that particularly impressed us was the master scheduler program. The graphical display of work schedules and employee availability coupled with a simple drag and drop method of allocating work orders to craftsmen is very useful as a lot of our users have relatively little computer experience. The IMPACTxp system also represented good value for money in comparison to some of the other systems that we looked at.”

“The help desk operators find the IMPACTxp system very easy to use. The call logging screens are clear and the fact that we could set up multiple field help lists means that very little typing is needed (which reduces man hours). Most of the information can be entered by selecting information from a drop down list. Navigation around the IMPACTxp system is simple with several options for moving between programs.”

“Yes, customer service has improved. Five months after the help desk was introduced, we sent out a survey to our customers to find out their opinions about the new system. Almost 90% of the survey respondents considered the help desk to be providing an improved service.”

“Customers are sure now that when they log a call to the help desk it will be recorded on the
system and dealt with promptly. Communication between customers and the technical services department has improved. The help desk operators have instant access to information about the calls logged - instead of having to sort through lots of paperwork to find the information they are looking for.”

“No, the number of breakdown calls has remained the same. However this is largely due to the nature of our business. There are thousands of people both staff, patients and visitors that use the hospital facilities on a daily basis and this will always result in the generation of a large number of calls to the help desk. These calls would include repairs to toilets, medical gases, lighting, beds and trolleys, broken door handles, etc.

“Definitely. This has been one of the greatest benefits of the system so far. It is now easier
to identify who is doing what and where it is being done.”

“Yes, by utilizing the master scheduler program a foreman can instantly see who is available
for work or who is overloaded so he knows instantly who to allocate tasks to.”

“The management summary report, progress monitor graphs, task nature analysis and plant
activity display within IMPACTxp give us the best management information.”. (Management
summary report displays a summary of the maintenance activity in graphical or tabular form
within a designated time period). Progress monitor graphs are a series of graphical reports
that indicate activity and cost trends for a selected period of time. Task nature analysis is a graphical or tabular report that displays the work completed by job type and craft. Plant activity display is a tabular report that allows the user to view all the information associated with a specific plant item such as current work orders, archived work orders, scheduled work orders and minor defects.”

“The report builder package has been an extremely useful tool for designing custom reports. Some we have created include response times to work orders, monthly work order costs by department, completion comments report, high level costing and statistical reports for the hospital’s Executive Management Group. Also the fact that you can allow users to access customized reports from their main IMPACTxp menu screens is very useful.”

“The initial installation service provided by Matrix RM Ltd was very comprehensive and well
handled. Ongoing support from Matrix via the Helpdesk is excellent. The operators are always
pleasant and will talk you through step by step any changes / fixes that need to be carried
out. IMPACTxp on-line help is very useful.”

“With any system implementation you would anticipate problems arising with it but since
implementing the IMPACTxp system in June 1999 we have had relatively few problems and most of these have been minor and were dealt with promptly. All of the main users of the system are very happy with its performance and have had no problems using it. From an administration point of view the IMPACTxp system is easily maintained and we are particularly impressed with the flexibility the system allows for customization to suit individual users preferences and requirements. Also we found that the training courses provided by Matrix have been excellent.”

case study