To those with employees and multiple crews

[Neil_Asheville 114]

Do you have a shop/office you meet at every morning to assign work for the day?

Do you coordinate at the end of the day on where to meet following day?

Do you have them drive personal cars to jobsite?

You can see these are broad and random questions. In your experience, what is the most effective way to schedule / coordinate daily, say, two crews on two rigs?

Thanks!

/neil

[R L S 14]

I always start help out by having them meet me at the job or a location where I would pick them up. Once they haved learned enough and I can send them out on their own they meet at my house and take a rig. But then usually shortly after that they get fired or get sick of working saturdays and quit, or go to jail or........ Hope it helps!! Stay Warm

[tinsley 14]

We do a schedule for each week we have 7 tech, 3 trailer rigs and some jobs that we do we supply a tech and customer supplys machine and soap. Everyone comes in at the scheduled time and go out to their assinged jobs with a assinged truck and trialer if needed. They all come to the office/shop before they leave out and return to the office to turn in the paper work i have them fill out.

[Beth n Rod 1,279]

My responses in blue:

Do you have a shop/office you meet at every morning to assign work for the day?

We meet at our shop each day at the same time unless extra travel is required and they will report earlier.

At the shop, they are assigned check out/in sheets, work orders and company paraphernalia. They check out the equipment, supplies and tools assigned them per specification of the sheet that has their name on it, assuring all is in working condition and dispatch upon double checking of load.

When they return, they check everything back in and refill containers, check/clean equipment and sign out. On Fridays, they wash the vehicles and clean the interiors.

Do you coordinate at the end of the day on where to meet following day?

We always meet at the shop. We do have meetings before dispatching and sometimes at the end of day to discuss events that have come to mind and inform of any changes in scheduling or time to report.

Do you have them drive personal cars to jobsite?

No, they ride in company vehicles containing the equipment used to perform the work. Having them take their own vehicles adds to the expenses by having to pay their fuel or mileage + hourly wage (required by Maryland Division of Labor and Licensing)

We have assigned drivers who are on an umbrella insurance policy, the others just ride along.

You can see these are broad and random questions. In your experience, what is the most effective way to schedule / coordinate daily, say, two crews on two rigs?

With the weather as a concerning factor, there is a bit of last minute change ups depending upon what mother nature produces or is forecast to, but negating that and all is clear, we schedule a few days in advance for each crew and notify our clients accordingly. Since we run a 2-gun unit, we can send one vehicle out with 2 crew men to work and complete 2-4 decks a day-washing.

3 man crews to complete the same # of decks according to size and wind conditions.

The other single gun unit goes out on house washing and other activities that only require a single person (sometimes 2 if extensive landscaping and/or other pita factors are present.

Each crew gets a nextel with 2-way only so they can contact the office for any instructions or change orders that may come along in the cases such as furniture still on deck, gate locked etc.

Thanks!

neil

There is not yet an exact science or reliable methodology to scheduling crews due to factors that are out of our control such as;

-Homeowner not leaving water on

-Pets in back yard

-Homeowner leaves on vacation and does not inform us beforehand so we can ensure all is set before they leave

-Parking limitations

-Terrain and obstructions to access

-Low water flow

-Homeowners who interfere with the work process or try to manipulate the crews to perform outside of the work orders creating time loss

These factors and perhaps others that have not come to mind can hamper or even limit the amount of work that can be accomplished and lead to extensive time loss and excessive travel times or extra trips for the crews.

We try to limit the occurrences of them but at times life happens and we try to work around peoples schedules as best we can.

Next~

Rod!~