Northwards Housing and Manchester Working mobilise productivity and service level delivery 
Manchester Working Limited (MWL) is a joint venture between leading repairs and maintenance provider Morrison and Manchester City Council, which was incorporated in September 2006. The company was created following the decision of Manchester Council to transfer its housing stock under the Housing Investment Options Strategy. One of MWL's main customers is Northwards Housing Ltd.
From day one, MWL felt that there were potentially huge benefits for the responsive repairs and maintenance operation if they could utilise mobile and handheld technologies to support, manage and control mobile operatives. This was a view which was very much shared by Northwards Housing.The advent of the new system meant it was an ideal opportunity to introduce mobile working practices. However, it was essential for any mobile system to be an integral part of the new incoming IT system.
The challenge was to find a PDA based mobile technology solution that could meet the demanding requirements of a large mobile workforce in the field but one that would also integrate tightly with the new back office IT set up.After a review of the market,
1st Touch mobile technology was chosen as it already offered tight integration with Civica, ROCC and Opti-Time. It also had a proven track record of success with many other social housing associations; including a number of those managed by Morrison.
As Danny Hussey, Database Group Leader at Manchester Working says, "When we went live, we needed to identify a mobile solution that allowed us to provide an effective mobile solution for Northwards but it had to be something that sat well with the back-office systems. This requirement was met by 1st Touch, so we chose them to deliver this functionality."
Larry Patrick, Director of Property Services at Northwards Housing went on to say, "In general terms, 1st Touch has certainly helped us to drive forward service performance for our tenants. However, it has been really productive in quantifiable terms too. There are a number of performance indicators which had been static for quite some time and these have improved dramatically with 1st Touch Mobile technology in place. As a three star excellent organisation, this was really important to us as naturally our primary objective is to be an excellent service provider" download the case study  |
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Upcoming events  Dates and Venues:
1st July 2010 - Chelsea F.C., London
6th July - D.W. Stadium, Wigan
Building on the success of the Northern Housing Consortium HITex programme, this is the second year for the MOBex exhibition, responding directly to the requests of consortium members to provide an opportunity to evaluate a wide range of mobile working solutions in one venue, on one day.
This event is open to all, attendance is free and includes lunch and refreshments |
