What's the cost of unreliable technology?

You'll soon realise that the costs of unreliable technology are not just financial. There are "soft costs" too like loss of staff morale and unhappy clients, which can have a long-term impact on your business.

• Site revisits cost you dearly; Lost opportunities or surveyor overtime – neither is great for your company
  The cost of sending a surveyor back to site to complete a survey again is high. If its during normal work hours, you face a lost opportunity cost; it's time they could be working on other money-earning jobs. If the site-revisit is out-of-hours, you may end up paying overtime. Neither option is appealing, and both will have an impact on your company finances.
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• Surveyors with poor technology become frustrated at work. But when the technology is good, surveying can feel fun and rewarding again
  Most people expect a "Google-level" service and experience when using technology nowadays. So anything less can lead to surveyors feeling frustrated. The types of things that cause frustrations include software crashes, poor user interfaces, and slow data entry. On the flipside, when your technology is reliable, you can focus on the surveying and your time on-site becomes more enjoyable.
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• Technology failures have a cascade effect; Delays issuing reports, unhappy clients, and your cashflow will suffer
  When your technology fails or has downtime, it'll prevent you from issuing reports. This has a knock-on effect; Firstly, your clients are left waiting for reports, which can delay their projects and cause bad feelings. Secondly, you can't invoice as quickly, so your cashflow will suffer.
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• Software that works offline – and syncs data reliably – is a must. Sitting in the car trying to transfer data will annoy even the most optimistic surveyor
  Syncing data can be a pain on older software products. You tap the sync button, then nothing happens. Or it may take hours to transfer data on a slower 2g / 3g network. No one enjoys sitting in the car at the start or end of the day trying to download/upload jobs. And meanwhile, the office is chasing you for an update, adding to your stress. Modern software apps work seamlessly offline – or in poor network connections – and have automatic data sync.‍

Flow co-founder, David King explains the true cost of unreliable surveying software.

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