Interview with Steve Divic, National Inventory and Procurement Manager, Australia
BACKGROUND
Steve is responsible for a large remit at TKE including inventory, returns, procurement, sourcing and repair. With a business model that involves critical infrastructure and tight SLAs for clients including nursing homes and hospitals, TK Elevators needed the flexibility to allow their technicians to change jobs based on urgent requirements.
”Droppoint has been great for the business - it’s given us a lot more efficiency and autonomy in relation to collecting our parts.When we do have a challenge - Droppoint is there to support us and provide solutions, rather than extra problems which we have had with other logistics companies.”
CHALLENGE #1
Managing technicians time and productivity.
The initial reason that TKE reached out to Droppoint was because of the Pre-9:00 am next day delivery service.
This service delivers parts before 9:00am into a Droppoint locations next to job sites. With re-routing of technicians due to urgent requirements (such as a breakdown of an emergency lift), having parts available and having the technicians notified was a game changer for technician productivity.
SOLUTION #1
Pre-9:00am delivery service keeps the team moving.
With traditional carriers, if a parcel is delivered but not collected by the technician because the technician has been moved to a more urgent job or re-routed, one of two things happen. The parcel may be left with reception or someone in the building. Alternatively the parcel is returned to the depot. Often if the parcel is left with in an unknown place - the technician loses time tracking down the parcel or even a whole day if they need to re-organise delivery.
Droppoint solves these issues by delivering the parcel into a nearby Droppoint location before9:00am. The technician can collect it whenever it suits them, and is notified of the parcels delivery and location. Meaning that urgent job request, doesn't mean parcel delays down the track.
“The Beauty of Droppoint is that it doesn’t matter what diversion or critical changes in routine our technicians have, they are able to pick up the part at their leisure near their site location - it doesn’t matter if they get called away - the part will still be there - you’re not dealing with re-organising delivery if collection windows are missed”.
CHALLENGE #2
Critical Infrastructure and service requirements
As a company in charge of managing installing and maintaining elevators, this can, in many cases be considered critical infrastructure, for example within an emergency ward at a hospital or a nursing home or care centre where residents need the elevator to move about.
There are also issues that require emergency re-routing of technicians like someone trapped in an elevator. This requires critical parts availability.
SOLUTION #2
Meeting and managing variable Service Levels with same day delivery
TKE have some very tight Service Level Agreements (SLAs) depending upon the industry or client they are working with. For example they may have an emergency lift in a hospital that requires critical repairs.
TKE have a common SLA of 48 hours, but based on situation, they can have some instances withSLAs as low as 2-4 hours or for residential elevators they can be as high as 72. There is a cost to the business if the service level is not meet, so having Droppoint managing the parts into the Droppoint networks is so necessary. For critical jobs, TKE use Droppoint’s cross-town courier service to get parts into a nearby Droppoint or direct to a client location within the same day. Often within hours of making the request.
With such variable service levels if anything goes awry, Steve says the support at Droppoint means you get fast solves and immediate follow up.
“The best success for us is probably Sydney - for example a technician that is handling theWestern part of Sydney, doesn’t have to fight through Sydney traffic to get to Alexandria when he’s got a shut down lift at Blacktown hospital. They confidently know the parts going to be there.”
SUMMARY
Droppoint has been great for the business - it’s given us a lot more efficiency and autonomy in relation to collecting our parts.When we do have a challenge - Droppoint is there to support us and provide solutions, rather than extra problems which we have had with other logistics companies.
