BigChange mobile technology helps Vianet keep the beer flowing

Vianet, whose Intelligent flow meters connect to the internet to provide real-time data on the dispensing of beer, has rolled out a 5-in-1 Mobile Workforce Management Platform from BigChange.  

The cloud-based system provides intelligent job scheduling, real time-vehicle tracking and a mobile app for engineers - giving Vianet a paperless end-to-end solution for the business.  Through the optimisation of the field service operation, Vianet has achieved a 10 percent improvement in Service Level Agreement (SLA) performance.

Vianet was first established 23 years ago and is the UK’s specialist in the monitoring of draught beer dispensing equipment. The company collects data from 12,500 sites which dispense over 570 million pints of draught beer every year. Vianet also provides contactless payment and ERP solutions for the vending industry where smart telemetry in machines connects to the internet to provide real-time data on product stock levels and machine performance.  In total Vianet monitor data from more than 230,000 connected devices providing detailed insight via its smart platform. 

“BigChange has completely transformed Vianet’s field service operations.” Says Craig Brocklehurst, Commercial Operations Director, Vianet.  “We now have complete visibility on the whereabouts and status of each engineer so we can provide a faster, more dynamic response.  And we’ve eliminated paperwork and with automated job scheduling the whole field service operation is optimised.  That’s boosting productivity and allowed us to improve our SLA performance by 10 percent.”

Vianet’s iDraught system intelligently monitors all aspects of the draught beer operations.  This helps to ensure quality and product yield is maintained also ensuring equipment is working properly so that the pub operator gets the best return from their draught products.  “The equipment monitoring is automated to the extent that the landlord may not actually be aware of any issues until they get a call from us saying we believe we may have identified an issue,” Brocklehurst explains.  

In pubs and bars, Vianet’s systems monitor dispensing equipment with automated alerts if there is a drop in performance or a fault.  Within BigChange jobs are then created and the closest engineer is immediately assigned and scheduled.  Equipped with rugged tablets, engineers use the BigChange JobWatch app for their job inspections and reports, including photographs of the site on arrival and on completion of the job.

With around 2000 calls a month, Vianet’s 24 engineers install and maintain their monitoring equipment for both draught drinks dispensing and vending across the UK.  With real-time tracking, the office has full visibility of the location of each engineer allowing jobs to be dynamically scheduled.  BigChange also monitors driver performance which is displayed on the engineers’ login screen to maintain awareness and encourage good, safe driving.  The tablets are also used for daily vehicle checks in place of paper reports.

“Using JobWatch gives us a complete, real-time view of all jobs, backed up with time and location data linked to comprehensive and accurate reports.  So, we are much better informed and we can closely monitor work performance from afar and increase the knowledge we have which in turn helps us in the training of our engineers,” says Brocklehurst.