Rentokil Initial is considering giving its worldwide
sales staff remote access to
enterprise resource planning systems from wireless laptops
after a UK pilot showed the technology could cut the time taken to
process orders from 15 days to three.
The hygiene services company, which employs 70,000 people, plans
to replace its paper-based sales process, which requires numerous
contacts with the customer, with a system based on wireless-enabled
Dell laptops.
"The biggest savings are in time. We have taken the processing
and completion of orders from between 15 and 20 days down to five
days typically and three days ideally," said John Canning, director
of IT services at Rentokil Initial.
The project uses laptops with embedded 3G cards and broadband
connections to enable the salesforce to access data on its
Oracle hosted ERP system over the internet.
About 500 sales staff are taking part in the pilot at the
company's washroom service and pest control businesses. It has
reduced the time needed to give quotes and place orders and has
freed up salespeople to spend more time selling.
The previous system was time-consuming and did not provide the
information staff needed when out of the office, said Canning.
Salespeople visited customers, took notes on a paper, returned to
the office, put together a quote, sent it out, and eventually took
an order, he said.
Sales teams are now able to sell more on customer visits, with
more time and information at their disposal. "The salespeople have
more opportunities and can do more business and get more sales,"
said Canning.
Rentokil has secured access to its ERP system through a
Remote Authentication
Dial In User Service (Radius) server. The company uses security
certificates on the PCs and requires staff to log on with a user
name and password.
The IT department faced challenges to get users to adapt to the
new ways of working. "Some of the difficulties are with people that
have never used laptops before, who seem to think it is the same as
using a computer in the office. But they have to realise that they
cannot always connect," said Canning.
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