Transparent safety & standardized best practices with PrimeLine

PrimeLine is a leader in the utilities space for a reason

Combining quality service, the highest ethical and environmental standards, and a drive for target zero safety has been key to their success. That’s why when PrimeLine wanted to create safety and compliance reporting that matched their goals and could aggregate data from the field without using paper, they knew they had to change the way they worked. Not just to improve efficiency but also for the safety of their utility company customers, the public, technicians, and contractors.

Safety & standardization go hand-in-hand

PrimeLine started working with TrueContext in 2017 to help empower their safety, quality assurance, and compliance reporting. Now when safety auditors complete audits, customized reports are automatically generated to document that safety processes and compliance regulations were met. The same reports can also be shared with customers to validate service agreements. This means PrimeLine can provide premium service with unparalleled responsiveness to customer needs and a high level of visibility.

Since PrimeLine is a group of subsidiary companies, fully digital workflows mean they can create best practices and then standardize them across their companies—saving leaders in the subsidiaries from expending energy for challenges other subsidiary companies have already solved. For example, if a customer or OSHA request is tackled by one company, PrimeLine can create a PDF report directly from the other company’s workflows. Before, with paper, this wasn’t possible as the workflows were not easily adapted or replicable.

A better way to work for field teams

Compliance regulations are ever-changing, especially across geographical borders, so it’s critical to be able to iterate quickly. PrimeLine’s admin staff can update workflows so rapidly that it’s often not visible to the field user—it simply becomes an integrated part of their workflow. Field teams instead get to focus on providing safe service and completing safety audits without needing to track that the right data is collected and delivered where it needs to go.

Similarly, conditional logic, decision trees, and help documentation embedded into workflows mean that newer technicians and safety auditors can complete work without slowing down their service to ask questions to senior staff. Everything is where they need it, when they need it, resulting in more confident service that follows best practices every time.

This change in the way technicians work has helped PrimeLine and their subsidiary companies to retain and recruit talent in a local market where most companies are still using paper and can’t offer the data and insights that PrimeLine can. They are also able to promise less admin work and no after-hours reporting thanks to embedded touchpoints that already gather the required data inside the workflow. It means technicians get to focus on what they’re good at: delivering quality service, safely.

Illuminating reports and usable utility data

When servicing complex, massive infrastructure assets, capturing and sharing the right data to provide evidence to compliance bodies is key. PrimeLine’s commitment to industry-leading safety and compliance doesn’t just stop at improving workflows and technician experience. PrimeLine uses all the data gathered to aggregate data sources, customer data files, and internal data into one system that’s on demand.

This means that reports are timely as they can be grabbed the moment they are asked for. For example, when a safety incident occurred previously, PrimeLine as a parent organization would need to rely on local experts to aggregate data and gain insights to respond. Now PrimeLine has a standardized system for all subsidiaries and can step in and assist.  

“We’re building solutions the way we know we need to be built. Directly in the hands of people who know our customer needs and employee needs. We picked the right solution for us.”

MATT LAMBERT
VP OF OPERATIONS

Once safety and compliance workflows were put in place, the new way of working caught the attention of people across the subsidiary organizations and has caused their workflows to scale beyond safety. PrimeLine technicians across their organizations use Going mobile has transformed business processes for Roadway Worker Training. Forms are now much easier to read, and with the addition of required fields, such as the signature field, workers can’t leave out crucial data. Instant form submission has expedited turnaround for invoices. “As soon as they’re finished at that job site, they can send that form in and we have it immediately,” says Jennifer Weithman of Roadway Worker Training. “In turn, I can send my invoices out quicker, which can help with our cashflow.” for everything from pre-job briefings with photos, to completing timesheets, generating customer progress reports that are emailed to them directly, and end-of-day job site photo and wrap-up workflows.

Winning new business with a competitive differentiator

For the utility industry, safety and compliance can be seen as a painful but necessary process. For PrimeLine, it’s a differentiator.

PrimeLine now wins contracts thanks to their ability to package and present their transparent and tracible safety processes, which ultimately de-risks work for their end clients. Clients can see what work was performed, when, and how compliance and safety standards have been met every time. This innovation has pushed PrimeLine to the forefront of the utility industry and set the standard for safety and compliance reporting.

As PrimeLine looks to the future, further innovation around data capturing and automation are not far from their mind. With TrueContext underpinning their plans, their goals of building safer work for the public and employees looks bright.