Julien Locher gets to surprise and delight his customers on a regular basis. How so? By fixing issues before the client even knew a problem existed.
All in a day’s work for a Schindler elevator maintenance technician. For seven years it has been his mission to ensure residents in the beautiful Swiss city of Bern can go about their daily lives and businesses uninterrupted. And the digital technology he relies on makes this mission easier than ever.
Julien’s work impacts thousands of people across stores, banks, medical centers, hospitals, federal buildings and even the Swiss parliament. He takes great pride in the customer relationships he has developed and his knowledge of their businesses. But, surprisingly, Julien’s ultimate goal is for his work to be invisible.
That’s because for him, like everyone at Schindler, ensuring his customers’ elevators and escalators operate smoothly (or ‘maximizing customer uptime’ as it’s known in the trade) is a big deal. So is minimizing disruptions: "The most important thing," he says, "is to really get to know the customer and their needs and to act in the background." Working with maximum efficiency while keeping a low profile means fewer interruptions for building users.
Thanks to the accelerating popularity of digitally connected elevators, incredible levels of customer care can now happen in the background. Often unnoticed by the customer, Schindler is using real-time data from the elevators to diagnose issues, determine maintenance requirements and, yes, schedule service calls.
But what does a typical day look like for Julien? Daily jobs are prioritized then communicated to his smartphone app.
Naturally Julien also uses his professional judgment to structure his day: "I speak with customers a lot to work out how to prioritize jobs and keep their buildings running smoothly," he says.
Making certain of speed and efficiency, Julien is backed up on every job by detailed, accurate data from one of Schindler’s Technical Operation Centers (TOCs) and Schindler’s teams of product specialists. The TOCs are Schindler’s central hubs that monitor and collate data from customers’ connected elevators and turn it into actionable insight.
What really blows customers’ minds, however, is when Julien shows up to address an issue they didn’t know existed. Welcome to the world of the connected elevator…
The operational status of these digitally enabled mechanisms is carefully monitored by Schindler’s TOCs, allowing them to identify and address many problems remotely (and invisibly). Where on-site action is required, the TOC sends data from the connected elevator to flag issues to Julien and his colleagues via the Fieldlink app.
But more than this, it also provides diagnostic hints as to the potential problem. "The app helps me fix problems quickly," he explains. "If I’m called to a 20-floor office building, for example, I know to go straight to the right elevator on the right floor and what procedure I’ll need to carry out. I’ve often fixed the problem before the customer even knew about it!"
With faster response times, faster repairs and therefore dramatically less disruption, the positive impact to customers of connected elevators is immense. "It builds up a good relationship between you and the customer because they trust in what you do," confirms Julien.
Simply put, the addition of digital insight to our maintenance technicians’ professional expertise and customer knowledge helps Schindler maximize elevator uptime and keep buildings moving. And that’s great news for our customers.