For an industry that prides itself on the latest technology to keep passengers and freight moving, one thing that has been left behind is the many processes still completed with paper.
Ready to change that is technology expert Switched On, which is improving safety and sustainability in the rail industry through digitalisation. The company has launched a service in which it can build and transform paper forms into mobile web forms to save time and money.
Tony Young, managing director, said: “The long-term objective is simple, to eliminate all paper documentation on all construction and railway sites. It makes complete sense, both from an efficiency and environmental point of view.
“The idea was born out of being fed up from standing at a printer on a Thursday printing out the ridiculous amount of forms in readiness for the next weeks work, not only the time it was taking, but also the cost implications.”
The solution is a system that can mobilise any business process, including inspections, checklists, orders, reports, incidents and audits. Developed with the rail industry in mind, the team not only build all railway trackside forms, but can cater for all disciplines and departments.
Tony, who has previously worked for Network Rail and Carillion, said: “We have the expertise and system to provide an organisation with the platform to go paperless, from safe work packs, task briefings and work package plans, through to construction phase plans, permits and timesheets.
“We create powerful and beautiful mobile applications, including data collection forms. Our system allows data capture forms to be built, as well as menus, mapping, listing and details screens, with the customer able to customise the application’s look and feel with your own colour scheme, icons and images.”
In addition, the organisation has also created a digital signature capture solution that can be adapted to several different companies and setups all within the Switched On platform.
Tony said: “Although a relatively new company, there is already a lot of interest in what we can offer. Recently we’ve been asked to build and produce a Network Rail approved task briefing sheet, which not only has the ability to have multiple signatures but, can be sent to multiple users in stages.
“The signature field within the mobile form comes paired with an auto-generated QR code. The signatory scans the code with their personal device, which navigates to a web page where they can enter their signature which uploads to the form on the original device.
“It is quick, simple and can apply to a wide variety of scenarios and documents or forms.”
Visit https://www.switchedon.app/ for more details.
