Construction Safety Week 2017: 5 Stats Every Safety Manager Needs to Know

Posted on May 5, 2017May 12, 2025 by Danny Kanev

Construction Safety Week 2017: 5 Stats Every Safety Manager Needs to Know

Construction Safety: By The Numbers

8 & 24

The number of hours in which you are required to report a work-related death (8) or injury/hospitalization (24). Most companies never imagine an accident will happen until it actually does. In the construction industry, it is critical to have a system in place for properly documenting, reporting, and storing all data that relates to accidents on job sites. This will not only make it easier to comply with the strict OSHA regulatory standards of accident reporting but can also reduce the risk of litigation due to safety negligence. And since it is now a requirement to electronically submit all injury records to OSHA, using a mobile OSHA 300, 300A, or 301 form to collect this information cuts out all manual data re-entry on the backend.

47%

Percentage of fatalities that construction companies with less than 10 employees account for. This number is was discovered during a 3-year study conducted by The Associated General Contractors of America. It sheds a spotlight on the negligence and utter lack of safety procedures found in small construction firms. The good part is that solutions like GoCanvas can be implemented without much cost and instantly increase data visibility across job sites so that items like proper maintenance inspections, daily safety reporting, and more are conducted properly. The size of a project doesn’t dictate the amount of risk involved, and having proper safety procedures in place can help prepare personnel for all potential dangers they may encounter on the job site.

78%

The increase in maximum penalties under the new OSHA guidelines as of August 1st, 2016. Companies found to be committing a ‘Willful or Repeated’ violation are now subject to a $124,709 fine. this is an increase of over $54,000 from previous years. Companies committing a ‘Serious’ violation are now subject to a fine of $12,471, this is an increase of over $5,000. Fine are going to continue to rise in the coming years, and you can learn more here.

6,929

The total number of ‘Fall Protection’ violations in 2016, and the #1 most cited violation by OSHA for 6 straight years according to Construction Dive. This consistent ranking shows that companies are still not approaching this issue with enough seriousness and attention. Simple Fall Protection mobile checklists can help construction companies monitor for signs of negligence on job sites and put into place preventative actions that help prevent serious accidents from happening. The GoCanvas Application Store has over 20 Fall Protection mobile checklists that can assist construction workers in daily safety reporting, including checking their equipment and harnesses before they put themselves in danger.

32,000

The total number of workplace inspections conducted by OSHA in 2016. According to the OSHA FactSheet, this means that only 0.43% of the possible 7 million worksites in the U.S. was actually reviewed by federal staff due to understaffing and overwork. So in order to make the biggest impact, OSHA specifically target companies that have a history of past violations, worker complaints, referral of hazards from other regulatory agencies, and/or work in high-risk industries.

About GoCanvas

GoCanvas® is on a mission to simplify inspections and maximize compliance. Our intuitive platform takes care of the administrative tasks, freeing our customers to focus on what truly matters – safeguarding their people, protecting their equipment, and delivering exceptional quality to their customers.

Since 2008, thousands of companies have chosen GoCanvas as their go-to partner for seamless field operations.

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The Ultimate Guide to Quality Control Inspections

Managing a construction project is a complex and stressful process. Among other things, you have to coordinate project team members, materials, and equipment and ensure that contractors are not afflicted by the potential risks and hazards present at the construction site. That said, quality means different things to different people which is why you should…

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3 Ways Mobile Checklists Can Keep Your Healthcare Organization CQC Compliant

Posted on May 4, 2017February 7, 2025 by Danny Kanev

3 Ways Mobile Checklists Can Keep Your Healthcare Organization CQC Compliant

Business Operations | Inspections | Workflow Management

Keeping Compliant with Canvas

The Care Quality Commission is a major regulatory body in England that was established under the Department of Health in 2009. Its role is to monitor and inspect all organizations that provide medical care and ensure that patients are being given high-quality, safe treatments. In the case of healthcare organizations that are found to be in non-compliance with CQC regulations, they are at risk of substantial fines, legal action, or being shut down.

This type of government regulation is not just specific to England or the Healthcare industry, but similar to the likes of the USDA, OSHA, and the HSE in other countries. These organizations and more operate to ensure public safety and set fundamental standards for service quality. Sometimes these regulations can take a toll and hurt smaller businesses who don’t feel they have the resources to properly self-regulate themselves.

But there’s good news! Simple changes to the way data is captured and processed on a daily basis can drastically reduce the risk of failing an audit and increase compliance to a whole new level.

With GoCanvas, you are able to build your own mobile checklists and forms to meet the specific needs of your organization or facility. You are also able to browse pre-built checklists online that you use and we will build them to get you started in just a couple of days. All it takes is using one mobile form to see a dramatic increase in operational efficiency!

Why Paper Causes Failed Inspections

The reason why most organizations fail Care Quality Commission inspections is because more often than not someone failed to report an issue within their facility to the proper personnel. These issues reside for weeks and months without resolution until they become so big that either management finally sees them or a CQC auditor finds them and it’s too late.

What is the cause of this? This is the failure of the two P’s – People & Paper.

When inspections or checklists are filled out on a piece of paper, inherently the quality of the data is compromised. That is because there is no data validation with paper. Fields can be missing, unreadable, or incomplete when they eventually show up to the office for review. That is WHEN they actually show up to the office. It can take days and sometimes weeks to get a fully completed form back to the office, and then another couple days for that form to be fully reviewed and input into the company’s backend system. Ultimately this means that upper management won’t get a full report of these for at least a business week, meaning issues are going to take a while to be identified and properly resolved.

So, how can mobile checklists assist with this process?

3 Ways Mobile Checklists Can Increase Compliance

The beauty of mobile forms is how quickly and easily it turns static data into easy to access information that can be reviewed and shared in real-time. That is why mobile forms, especially checklists, are perfect for organizations and facilities that want to stay CQC compliant.

Here are the top reasons to make the switch to GoCanvas mobile checklists and forms:

#1. Photo, GPS, Date, & Time Verification

Mobile checklists with GoCanvas not only allow your employees to quickly verify that everything throughout the facility is in working order and compliant, but also allows them to easily document issues by snapping a photo and capturing a GPS stamp of the location of the deficiency. This information, along with a date and time stamp of the report, will then be instantly sent to a supervisor who can review it, note compliance issues, and schedule a same-day follow-up. This ensures that issues don’t linger on for weeks or months and reduces the organization’s, as well as patients’, exposure to potential risks.

#2. Custom Automation & Approval Workflows

With the GoCanvas platform, organizations are able to setup both simple and complex information automation for the review and approval of data. This is a feature we call Workflow. For organizations trying to stay CQC ( OSHA, USDA, etc) compliant, Workflow is a tool that allows for checklists to be filled out by field employees and transmitted to a supervisor’s mobile device for instant review. The supervisor can see exactly what was filled out by the employee, make changes if necessary, or even reject the report and send it back to the originator with a note as to why it wasn’t approved. This type of automation can instantly replace the need for needless phone calls, text messages, emails and ensure that reports are review and approved in a timely manner. An online dashboard is also available to view the status of all tickets so that nothing ever slips through the cracks.

#3. Data Validation & Instant Cloud Collection

The power of using mobile checklists truly comes from the quality of data that is able to be collected. Creating mobile checklists through GoCanvas allows your organization to create fields that are required to be filled out before a report is allowed to be submitted by your employees. This means that photo verification, signatures, time stamps, and more will always be a part of the reports that are submitted and that there will never be another incomplete submission ever again.

But the quality also comes from the fact that the data is collected instantly on the cloud and made accessible to the people who need to see it when they need to see it. There is no more waiting hours, day or weeks to view reports and the data is available to be connected to the systems that you already have setup for in-depth analysis. GoCanvas allows your organization to make real-time, data-informed decisions that can increase operational efficiency and dramatically reduce the risk of violations and/or fines.

About GoCanvas

Since 2008, thousands of companies have chosen GoCanvas as their go-to partner for seamless field operations.

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OSHA Requiring Employers to Electronically Submit All Injury Records: 4 Things You Need to Know

Posted on February 21, 2017May 13, 2025 by Danny Kanev

OSHA Requiring Employers to Electronically Submit All Injury Records: 4 Things You Need to Know

Analytics and Data Collection | Business Operations | Inspections

Starting January 1st, 2017, OSHA began enforcing a new resolution to the Federal Occupational Safety and Health Act. | 404 This new resolution put into place requirements that include the electronic submission of all workplace illness and injury records for the purposes of posting on the Occupational Safety and Health Administration website.

The motivation behind this new workplace regulation is to encourage workplaces across the country to “increase their efforts to prevent worker injuries and illnesses, and, compelled by their competitive spirit, to race to the top in terms of worker safety”, according to the official OSHA website. They have also enacted the new reporting requirements to better enable researchers to analyze safety data from across thousands of workplaces in order to develop new ways of addressing and preventing serious injuries.

Who Does This Affect

This is a far-reaching regulation that is impacting companies of all sizes and industries across the United States.

Criteria for companies required to digitally report injury data using an OSHA 300, 300A, or 301 Form includes:

Organizations of 250 employees or more that currently file injury reports using OSHA Forms 300, 300A, or 301
Organizations with 20-249 employees that fall within specific “high risk” industries

If you are still not sure if your company falls under the new regulation, you can read the final rule e-document on the Federal Register website by clicking here.

What You’re Required To Do

Any organization that falls within the criteria of the Federal Occupational Safety and Health Act is mandated to electronically submit all their Summary of Work-Related Injuries and Illnesses reports for 2016 (Form 300A) by July 1st, 2017. The same organizations will then be responsible for submitting all their documentation (Form 300, 300A, 301) for 2017 by July 1st, 2018.

To assist with this reporting process, OSHA has created three different ways that companies can submit their form data online. The three options include:

Webform: Companies can go online and input data directly on the OSHA website.
CSV File: Upload single or multiple reports using an Excel based file.
API Integration: Companies that have recordkeeping software can connect it directly to the OSHA database.

How GoCanvas Can Help

With this new regulation taking effect, we at GoCanvas immediately began working to see how we could help our clients. What obviously stood out to us was that the forms that OSHA required to be completed were being filled out on paper. Why hadn’t there been a mobile alternative for these forms even before this ruling to help increase efficiency?

The fact is that GoCanvas has been converting paper-based OSHA forms to mobile templates for almost a decade. In fact, Form 300, 300A, and 301 were already available as mobile templates in the GoCanvas application store before this regulation even took effect!

The advantage to having the ability to fill out a mobile version of these three forms is that it can essentially eliminate all back-end data re-entry you would be forced to spend if you continued to use a paper version. And since OSHA requires most records to be kept for at least 5 years, all your digital reports will be automatically stored in your secure GoCanvas cloud database for whenever you need them and won’t have to worry about lost or damaged paper records any longer.

How To Automate 95% of Your OSHA Reporting

The way GoCanvas significantly automates your back-end OSHA reporting is by quickly collecting and sharing your data via a CSV file or API connection – which are two of the three ways that OSHA allows for electronic reporting. GoCanvas is cutting out the “middle-man” in the data transfer process and allowing you to get the data in an OSHA compatible format. No longer does someone in the office have to wait for forms to be faxed, scanned, or driven back to the office. Everything is submitted in real-time and available in the format that you need when you need it for OSHA reporting! No data duplication required.

If you’re ready to get started, just click on the button below or email us at Info@gocanvas.com if you have any questions!

About GoCanvas

Since 2008, thousands of companies have chosen GoCanvas as their go-to partner for seamless field operations.

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Why States Need to Improve their Bridge Inspection Processes with Mobile Forms

Posted on February 15, 2017November 18, 2024 by Danny Kanev

Why States Need to Improve their Bridge Inspection Processes with Mobile Forms

Analytics and Data Collection | Business Operations | Inspections

The American Road and Transportation Builders Association (ARTBA) recently declared almost 56,000 bridges in the United States structurally deficient. Almost half of all states fall into the category of having 9% or more of their bridges structurally deficient. According to the ARTBA, “this means one or more of the key bridge elements, such as the deck, superstructure or substructure, is considered to be in “poor” or worse condition.”

Percentages of structurally deficient bridges by state 2017 data

More than 25% of all bridges (about 174,000) were reported as being at least 50 years old and never having major construction work.

This is pretty scary stuff. Officials tend to agree on the need to find new sources of funding for bridge and highway repair projects, as the current funding mechanisms haven’t kept pace with the cost of construction in recent years. However, this data also highlights the potential need for improved bridge inspection processes to ensure accurate data is collected, shared and analyzed quickly. Here are 5 reasons why bridge inspectors should be using mobile forms and apps for bridge inspections.

Mobile Bridge Inspections

Easily document bridge conditions and structures with photos

If inspections are currently being done on paper, it may not be easy to see visually the extent of damage and it may be easier for folks to put off improvements. If an inspector does happen to have a digital camera, time is probably wasted around getting the photos off the camera, printing them, attaching them to the inspection report and then storing them somewhere in a filing cabinet.

With mobile forms and devices, inspectors can complete bridge inspection forms and add photos to the reports at the same time, eliminating the need for an additional device and time wasted compiling the photos into a report later.

Prove an Inspection Happened

Ever wonder if an inspection really happened? Or if the form was filled out on-site instead of at another location? With mobile forms, a GPS and time stamp can be required as part of the process, so you can ensure inspectors are where they are supposed to be and doing the inspection on-site.

Standardize Inspection Processes

Ever have the problem where one person may fill the same form out differently than another? Maybe person A starts on page 3 and works backwards while person B starts on page 1. Or skips around. Or skips various fields. Or standard langauge to describe something isn’t being used so analysis becomes difficult.

With mobile forms, you can set them up so that various fields must be filled out, in a specific order, or the inspector cannot advance forward. This helps standardize inspection processes and ensure the right data is captured every time.

Get Data Back in Real-Time

With paper bridge inspection forms, someone fills them out and then has to get them back to the office. Many times, they’re just physically taken in, then scanned into a computer or worse, transcribed by hand into another system. All of this takes time and resources. And if there’s a crucial issue, it might not be seen until days later!

With mobile bridge inspections, the data is captured via mobile devices and stored in the cloud so it can be accessed instantly. No waiting around, no manual data re-entry or having to worry about expensive and annoying filing cabinets.

Digital Data = Easier Analysis

Can you imagine combing through paper inspection forms for thousands of bridges and trying to determine what the most common issues are with the deck or substructures? And trying to look for trends based on location, temperature, time of year, inspector, building material, etc? And you’re doing this with data that may not be structured optimally, having to read messy handwriting and account for missing fields and forms?

NIGHTMARE.

With digital inspection data, dashboards can easily be set up so you can see data at an aggregate level for a variety of fields and conditions. It is much easier to analyze digital data, look for trends and then prioritize issues so action can be taken!

As you can see, there are clear benefits to digitizing bridge inspections with mobile forms and apps. If you’d like to see how GoCanvas can help you improve these kinds of processes and save time while getting more accurate data, try us free today!

About GoCanvas

Since 2008, thousands of companies have chosen GoCanvas as their go-to partner for seamless field operations.

Check out even more resources

The Ultimate Guide to Quality Control Inspections

Read the blog

Constructions Digital Transformation

see for yourself

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read their story

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Feature Focus: Automate Approval Processes with Workflow

Posted on February 13, 2017February 24, 2025 by Danny Kanev

Feature Focus: Automate Approval Processes with Workflow

Business Operations | Inspections | Workflow Management

How Workflow Can Improve Your Daily Process

The Background

Many companies, whether they have gone paperless or not, struggle when it comes to processes that require the review and signature of multiple people within the organization. Often this, the collection of signatures, can be the most frustrating and time-consuming part of any data collection process. You are often forced to wait around until someone shows up with the forms for you to sign, or you have to become a detective and attempt to track down the last known whereabouts of the paperwork you need in order to get something processed. It can take a real toll on productivity.

Workflow was created to eliminate the need for the manual transportation of data.

Typical examples of forms that are involved in this type of approval process include Change Orders, Time cards, Safety Inspections, Expense Reports and more.

Industries that paper-based workflow procedures are most commonly found in today include:

Field Service
Oil & Gas
Construction
Retail
Manufacturing

How Does Workflow Work?

Essentially Workflow allows you to create a step by step procedure of how a form should be filled out, completed, and submitted using a mobile device.

The online “Workflow Manager” allows you to setup how each part of the mobile form should be filled out and who should receive each section of the form for review. This creation process ensures that when a form is being filled out on a project site that it will be reviewed and completed the proper way every single time.

It works as simple as a technician opening a GoCanvas mobile form on their smartphone and filling it out. Once the technician reaches the pre-determined end of that section, they will be notified that the data is being transferred to their supervisors’ device for review.

In real-time, the supervisor will get a push notification (similar to a text message) alerting them that they have a GoCanvas report to review. When they open it, they will be able to review all the past data and even add comments or reject it if they deem necessary. Once finished, the supervisor can submit the final report to the main office or transfer it to the next supervisor(depending on how the Workflow was created).

Why You Will Benefit

You will notice the impact on your business almost immediately. Instant benefits include:

Ability to review, sign, and submit reports in real-time
Recover 100’s of hours spent tracking down employees or reports
Eliminate the need for annoying texts, calls, or email reminders
Share photos, signatures, GPS coordinates and more directly from one device to another

Workflow gives your company a structured way to communicate data from the field to the proper supervisors in real-time. No more delays due to travel or human error. Get all the data that you need, when you need it.

Take a look at how Certarus has processed over 15,000+ invoice and time card submission requests using Workflow!

WANT TO LEARN MORE?

About GoCanvas

Since 2008, thousands of companies have chosen GoCanvas as their go-to partner for seamless field operations.

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Partner Snapshot: Forte Supply Chain Solutions

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4 Mobile Forms Every Field Service Company Should Have

Posted on February 3, 2017February 17, 2025 by Danny Kanev

4 Mobile Forms Every Field Service Company Should Have

Analytics and Data Collection | Business Operations | Forms | Inspections

When it comes to the Field Service industry, time means everything. Many companies charge customers a flat rate fee instead of an hourly rate, so it’s in the best interest of the service technician to complete as many jobs per day as possible.

So how do mobile forms come into play? Efficiency!

Using mobile forms instead of paper has proven to be a faster way to collect, share, and learn from your data in real-time. GoCanvas has an app store of over 20,000 mobile form templates from various industries.

So the only question is, which forms should you get started with first?

The Top 4 Mobile Forms for Field Service Technicians

#1. Field Service Report – This form is key to getting any job done, no matter what service you are performing. With this mobile report, you have the ability to capture key data points like Time on Site, Project Images, Customer Requirements, Project Costs, and more. The best part is that you can create tasks to be assigned to technicians that are already out in the field by using GoCanvas Dispatch. The technician simply has to open up the Field Service Report on their mobile device, read the assigned dispatch, and complete the rest of the report when they arrive on the job site.

#2. Invoice – A crucial part of any business is getting paid. But most companies still struggle with collecting payment in a timely manner. That is why the mobile Invoice form is critical for those who struggle with this issue, and for those who no longer want to wait days or weeks to get jobs processed. Another feature is the ability to collect payment instantly using our integration with Square! You can have your data flow from GoCanvas directly into your existing invoice software including Quickbooks.

#3. Change Order Form – The ability to make quick changes on a job site is key. With the mobile Change Order Form and our calculation functionality, you can quickly display the costs of the proposed change to the customer and get their digital signature in seconds. A copy of the form will be sent to the customer, the back office, and to the parts supplier for immediate delivery.

#4. Daily Time Sheet – The hardest thing for any company to accurately capture is an employee’s work hours. The problem is that this data is usually captured on a weekly basis but rarely turned in on time. If this data isn’t turned in on time, then no one gets paid. With the mobile Daily Time Sheet form, an employee can simply input their hours each day and submit it to the office. At the end of the pay period, the office accountant can simply export every employee’s work hours into an Excel spreadsheet. We can even help you create an automated dashboard or report that neatly organizes and totals up each employee’s weekly hours for you!

About GoCanvas

Since 2008, thousands of companies have chosen GoCanvas as their go-to partner for seamless field operations.

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Smarte Carte Saves 200 Hours Per Month with GoCanvas Inspections

How Smarte Carte Saves 200 Hours Per Month on Inspections

Overview

Industry: Transportation & Logistics
HQ Location: White Bear Lake, Minnesota
Website: Visit Here

Quick Facts

Created & deployed 10+ mobile forms
Recovered 200 hours/app per month in productivity
Over 26,000+ digital records captured annually

The Background

Founded in 1970, Smarte Carte has grown into a global enterprise of 1,300+ employees that service over 1,900 locations worldwide. Their inventory of self-service luggage carts, lockers, strollers, and more can be seen in almost every major airport, train station, mall, amusement park, resort, and fitness club across the world. With their ever-expanding footprint across the world, it quickly became a top priority that Smarte Carte was able to view and access field data in real time.

The Problem

Every day, hundreds of Smarte Carte service technicians are dispatched to various client locations to inspect and service equipment. When service technicians were previously using paper forms, data would routinely come back to the office late or with data errors. These mistakes made it almost impossible for team leaders like Eric Zitelman, Retail Regional Manager, to be able to efficiently track the daily production of their field employees.

The Solution

This is why Eric and several other team leaders at Smarte Carte decided to deploy GoCanvas mobile forms in order to increase the consistency and accuracy of the data collected at client locations

For Smarte Carte, the deployment of GoCanvas mobile forms started with a pilot of 450 fitness clubs across the United States. The reason? Eric Zitelman and his fellow regional team leaders needed a better way to track the daily productivity of their field service technicians.

With GoCanvas, Smarte Carte was able to create mobile forms that require service technicians to collect all the key pieces of information about the equipment they are inspecting before they are able to submit it. Once completed, the technician reports now automatically transmit directly from their mobile device to their regional supervisor. This allows for the instant analysis of each report in real-time, as well as the tracking of the productivity of each technician on a daily basis. Due to the success of the pilot program, Smarte Carte now uses GoCanvas across 1,600 fitness clubs!

The Outcomes

Since then, Smarte Carte has expanded its use cases to include everything from Field Service Reports to Driver Time Logs. These mobile forms utilize features such as:

GPS Capture
Photo Capture
Reference Data
PDF Designer

These features help Eric and the upper management at Smarte Carte to quickly verify the accuracy of all the data being collected, as well as to generate highly detailed reports. This enables them to track critical performance KPIs on the backend and to make proactive decisions within their global operations process.

Since starting with GoCanvas in 2017, Smarte Carte is still finding new ways to integrate GoCanvas mobile forms into their various departments and workflows. In their first year of using GoCanvas to replace paper reports, Smarte Carte has captured and stored over 26,000 digital records. This has resulted in a recovery of over 200 hours per month in productivity!

Ready to Rethink How You Work?

GoCanvas has helped a variety of businesses across multiple industries transform their safety processes and rethink their efficiency, ultimately saving them money. Why not do the same? Reach out to one of our experts today to kickstart your process revolution.

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Feature Focus: The Benefits of Dispatch

Posted on January 5, 2017November 18, 2024 by Danny Kanev

Feature Focus: The Benefits of Dispatch

Analytics and Data Collection | Dispatching and Scheduling | Inspections

This week we spotlight Dispatch, the easiest way to communicate with your field personnel without picking up a telephone.

Dispatch allows companies, big and small, to eliminate the need for time-consuming task assignment and tracking. It gives the ability to create tasks, assign them to employees, and track their completion status in real-time right from the Dispatch Dashboard on the GoCanvas website.

Dispatch is perfect for:

Assigning Work Orders, Inspections, and more
Scheduling assignments individually or in mass
Tracking job status & reports in real-time
Construction, HVAC, Retail, Energy & Utilities, Home Healthcare

How it Works

The best part about the Dispatch functionality is that it connects the office with the employees who work in the field.

Office employees, those of who typically interact with the GoCanvas website, would use the Dispatch Manager to create and organize their field employees’ daily tasks. They can choose any of the mobile forms that are currently published and begin pre-filling out details for the task before it gets assigned. The types of fields within the mobile form that can be pre-filled include Text Boxes, Checkboxes, Dates, Times, Dropdowns, and more. You can even dynamically add items into “Loop” or “List Screens”, which allows for tables to be pre-filled out before they arrive to field employees.

Keep in mind, the dispatched task does NOT have to be immediately sent for completion. The “Dispatch Type”, as seen below, can be toggled to “Schedule Dispatch” and be triggered to be sent at a future date and time. This is perfect for companies that have re-occurring inspections(3,6,12-month), have the need to schedule follow-ups, or book appointments days in advance.

The Benefits

When the office completes creating dispatches, any marked as “Immediate Dispatch” would instantly notify the assigned employee with a push notification. This immediately reduces the time it would normally take for the employee to come into the office, pick up their assignments for the day, and drive out to the first location.

Once the employee receives their Dispatch(s), they are able to scroll through the details and view the pre-filled info of each report. This can include addresses, dates, times, and more. When a Dispatch has begun being filled out, the employees in the office will view the status on the Dispatch Manager online change from “Assigned” to “Received”. And once the task is fully filled out and submitted to the online database, the status will once again change from “Received” to “Completed” in real-time. These status updates give management up-to-the-minute insight into how many tasks are being completed daily, if they are on-time, and which need to be re-assigned to other employees.

Is Dispatch For You?

If you are a company looking to increase efficiency by increasing the speed of data moving from A to B, then Dispatch is definitely a feature you should consider.

Dispatch will allow your company to cut out 100’s of hours a month when it comes to task management and scheduling, and will also increase the overall visibility of data across your entire organization. This will help in the communication of daily KPI’s like job completion, as well as assist with giving instant insight into reports as soon as they are submitted.

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About GoCanvas

Since 2008, thousands of companies have chosen GoCanvas as their go-to partner for seamless field operations.

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PVFC Saves Hundreds of Hours with Digital Inspections

Pikesville Volunteer Fire Company Saves Hundreds of Hours with Digital Inspections

working firefighters. male fire fighters. fire. fire department record management. Fighting fire and fighting paperwork. Saving time and saving people. Pikesville Volunteer Fire Company saves hundreds of hours. Paperless fire company.

The Background

Pikesville Volunteer Fire Company (PVFC) has been protecting Pikesville, Maryland since 1897. As the second oldest volunteer fire department in Baltimore County, it is the only station in Baltimore County that operates an engine, tower, heavy rescue squad, and medic, offering a full range of fire suppression, rescue, and EMS services for the community.

The Problem

Though much has changed since 1897, record keeping has continued on paper. Yet, with a full volunteer force, paper record management has become a heavier and heavier burden for the department.

This burden was affecting the PVFC in various ways. When members would go out and buy supplies for the station, it could take weeks for reimbursement (if the treasurer could even read the crumpled receipt).

When a truck or piece of equipment would break, the process to verify/repair it was especially slow. If a fire truck malfunctioned, the lieutenant/engineer would have to come into the station to verify the issue and order the correct part. If a lieutenant was out on the road for business, it could be days or over a week before that truck would be serviceable again.

Justin, both 1st Rescue Lieutenant at PVFC and Director of Channel Sales at GoCanvas, saw GoCanvas as a solution to these slow and cumbersome processes.

The Solution

In April 2014, they decided to go with GoCanvas, the global leader in mobile apps for business. PVFC found the transition easy and full supported. “I received a report from a volunteer I hadn’t even trained.” Justin said, “that shows you how accessible the platform is.”

PVFC found itself in the same position thousands of GoCanvas customers have; the GoCanvas platform—with 20,000+ customizable mobile apps, the app builder, and real-time app management—was revolutionizing their internal processes.

The Outcomes

By eliminating paper forms, PVFC has dramatically sped up their repair cycle. What once took over a week to order now happens in a day or less.

More Accurate Data

In addition to improving their equipment repair process, PVFC now captures more accurate information with GoCanvas. The Department of Transportation requires inspections of fire company vehicles twice a month. PVFC often struggled with incomplete forms, information filled out that didn’t pertain to the vehicle, and uncertainty on who inspected the vehicles.

With GoCanvas, these issues have been largely eliminated. By utilizing required fields, PVFC forms come back with all the necessary information. If a form is missing fields, then the volunteer won’t be able to submit the form. This forces completion of inspections with all necessary documentation.In addition, conditional screens ensure that inspections occur quickly and cover the appropriate parts of the truck. For instance, their Heavy Rescue doesn’t have a pump, so that section of the inspection can be skipped.On mobile devices, information is now safe from coffee spills and dirty cars. By no longer having to do manual data re-entry or chase down missing information, PVFC estimates that they’ll save hundreds of hours this year.

Easier Volunteer Tracking

In PVFC, there’s a credit system. Volunteers get credits for showing up to training, or fundraisers. With paper forms, employees had to sign in by hand at these events. Afterward, someone else would have to enter this information a second time, and try to decipher messy handwriting or illegible ID numbers. Not only did this take away time from other projects, but also allowed room for human error.Today with GoCanvas, PVFC can track volunteer credits more easily with almost no admin work. Volunteers can pick their name from a drop down list, and their ID number automatically populates. Hours automatically calculate eliminating mathematical errors. This means less time trying to find information, reduced mistakes, more accurate systems, and more time to focus on keeping Pikesville safe.

Flexibility to Meet Evolving Organizational Needs

As a cloud-based, mobile platform combined with an easy-to-use mobile app builder, GoCanvas provides PVFC the flexibility to quickly add new features and functionality to any of their mobile apps. As needs evolve and change, GoCanvas apps can be updated easily, with no programming required.For instance, as they have new volunteers, PVFC can go into their GoCanvas account and simply update the volunteer list they use in their check in app. Within seconds, the list changes will be updated for all their future events. This allows for an easy transition, with limited possibility for errors.Other mobile app alternatives make this process cumbersome or costly, weakening the effectiveness of their platforms. With GoCanvas it is a frictionless process at no additional cost.

With GoCanvas, PVFC continues to get rid of their paper forms. They’ve cut down administrative work, and improved information accuracy. Though much has changed since 1897, PVFC’s commitment to Pikesville safety remains the same.

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The Austin Company Streamlines Inspections with GoCanvas

The Austin Company Streamlines Inspections and Saves Money

Overview

The Austin Company is a US-based international firm, offering architectural, engineering, design-build, and construction management services. The company has a rich history with more than 135 years of experience serving clients in diverse industries.

The Background

One of their core values is a constant focus on safety and quality, ensuring a safe work environment for employees, clients, and partners. For every site or building inspection, the company has a rigorous process for quality and safety reports.

However, paper-based reports were causing delays and issues for the company and its inspection process. Since job site inspections were filled out manually, it could take hours or days for reports to return from the field to the office.

In addition, it required extra hours of data entry to put the final inspection information into their system. The Austin Company realized that paper was inefficient for its inspection program, and it was costing them precious time and money. They needed a better way to capture more information while improving productivity and efficiency.

The Solution

In February 2013, The Austin Company addressed this business challenge by turning to GoCanvas, the global leader in mobile apps for businesses. Thousands of organizations leverage Canvas’s cloud-based, “Software-as-a-Service” mobile app platform to replace cumbersome paper forms with highly-customizable mobile business apps for process improvement, enhanced site safety and overall data collection efficiencies.

The Outcomes

The Austin Company worked with GoCanvas to develop health and safety and quality apps to be used in the field for any on-site inspection project. About 40 safety and building inspectors are using GoCanvas currently to improve job site inspections. They have seen real and measurable results and improvements to their inspection processes.

These include:

Faster Information Collection

Inspections that once took 2 hours now take only 15 minutes. They found time savings with the powerful feature set GoCanvas provides. Ways they save time include:

Automatically populate forms with job site information such as name, location, and address, instead of filling this information out manually.
Fill out information that applies to specific job sites, without having to worry if they’re skipping fields they may or may not need.
Choose which section of a job site is being inspected and directly navigate to that section within the inspection form. Use automated color coding to quickly determine if a section of a form needs to be started, is in progress, or has been completed.

According to Charlie Engel, their director of QA/QC and Safety, this represents significant cost-savings and process improvements. For each inspection, Austin is saving money in both personnel time as well as the cost of paper, copier maintenance and supplies, and postage required for reports that were previously mailed out. The company is on pace to realize significant time savings in its first year of working with GoCanvas.

Real-Time Access to Data

Previously, collecting inspection information required a multi-step process. Inspectors would fill out the information by hand at the various sites. Forms would return to the office hours or days after the on-site inspection occurred. Finally, an employee would have to manually enter this information into the database. Only then could management access this important safety information.

With GoCanvas, all of these forms are now submitted immediately to the cloud. There, site managers can access inspection reports with a quick search. GoCanvas removes the need for any additional data entry or filing. Site managers can also do a mass export of forms when working on a report. With either an Excel or CSV file, these formats allow for easy integration into other back-end database systems.

Improved User Experience

Switching to GoCanvas has created an easier experience for The Austin Company’s inspectors. Instead of lugging around a clipboard and paper, employees carry smartphones that fit neatly in the palm of their hand.

Also, with conditional branching, inspectors can only fill out the sections they need to on their inspections. This helps them fill out inspections more quickly and not be frustrated by filling out the wrong section!

Instead of a lengthy description of the site, inspectors can now use one click to capture images of the site they’re inspecting. Not only do they expand the data Austin Company has, it helps make the inspector’s jobs faster and easier.

Flexibility to Meet Evolving Business Needs

As a cloud-based, mobile platform combined with an easy-to-use mobile app builder, GoCanvas provides The Austin Company the flexibility to add new features and functionality to any of their mobile apps. As needs evolve and change, GoCanvas makes editing apps a frictionless process.

For instance, as safety regulations change, The Austin Company can easily update its safety inspections to match new rules. What once may have taken hours or days to update, print and send out to various sites now happens in minutes.

With over 40 users and growing, The Austin Company has saved paper, time, and money that has more than paid off its investment in mobile apps. GoCanvas has given The Austin Company an easy-to-use mobile experience that allows the company to focus on quality projects for all its customers.

Ready to Rethink How You Work?

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