Optimizing Operational Efficiency with MobileOps: A Success Story of Crounse Corporation
How Crounse Corporation Leveraged MobileOps to Manage Compliance & Maintenance
Crounse Corporation, headquartered in Paducah, Kentucky, has been a leader in the inland river market since 1948 providing full service barge transportation as well as harbor and fleeting services. In 1969 Crounse Corporation opened a second operation facility in Maysville, Kentucky. Since then, their operation has grown to a fleet of 34 tugboats and over 1,100 barges. Transporting more than 30 million tons of cargo each year, Crounse Corporation has become one of the largest carriers in the river transportation industry and holds a well known reputation for providing outstanding customer service.
Crounse Corporation's Linda Reed
Challenge
As of July 2016, towing operations with vessels over 26 feet in length were required to start complying with a new USCG regulation known as SubChapter M. With SubChapter M companies need to start implementing a number of new standards and requirements such as providing various manuals and documents, such as; Towing Vessel Records, Health & Safety Manuals, Maintenance logs and much much more. These various new requirements help prove that their operation is safe and within compliance.
Having to provide objective evidence of all documents related to complying with SubChapter M has led companies to realize that there is a massive amount of paperwork involved and in turn, sought out an efficient tool to help organize and manage such paperwork. Crounse Corporation looked for a technology solution to help manage and reduce their paperwork as they navigated through the new SubChapter M operating environment.
Solution
Being one of the largest carriers in the river transportation industry with a team that provides safe, efficient and quality service, Crounse Corporation needed a software that met and would continue to meet their requirements. Having the ability to manage all the required audits and survey reporting between shoreside and their fleet was a major priority when it came to choosing a software management tool. Additionally, the daily operations of Crounse required that their chosen solution be very powerful and expandable when it came to managing compliance and maintenance. Most importantly, ease of use for all crew members was critical to Crounse in their selection process as crew members would be the leaders of data input and utilization.
After demoing the MobileOps platform Crounse came to the conclusion that all of their criteria could be met or exceeded by MobileOps.
With MobileOps Audits & Surveys feature Crounse was able to manage required audits along with survey reports between shoreside and vessels. MobileOps makes it easy to submit Audits & Surveys as well as link them with associated nonconformities and routines.
In regards to managing compliance and maintenance Crounse found the Safety & Training and Vessels modules to be very useful. With the Safety & Training module all drills and training that are now required by Sub M can easily be tracked and managed. The Vessels module helps companies with the tracking and record-keeping of all events on their vessels. This allows Crounse to stay up-to-date with all of the needed requirements set forth in Sub M, as well as to have the ability to provide objective evidence through a digital TVR.
The MobileOps team has made it one of their number one priorities to provide any operation the ability to capture all necessary data while remaining the simplest and most user-friendly software on the market today. By providing crew with an easy to use interface there is less reluctance on utilization which is a huge driver of the implementation success. Crewmembers are the leaders of data input and in turn, also crucial leaders of companies maintaining compliance and remaining operable.
Crounse Shoreside Staff Orientation
Results
For the past several months Crounse Corporation has been implementing MobileOps across their fleet and has found it to be a very powerful tool for their operation. A Crounse team member noted MobileOps “is extremely easy to use for everyone involved in the process, while also being extremely versatile and unrestricted from an expandability perspective.”
Crounse has not only been leveraging MobileOps for Regulatory and Compliance solutions, but has also found MobileOps useful for managing Engineering solutions as well. MobileOps has helped eliminate paper processes and centralize the documentation that is needed for Sub M compliance. In regards to auditing processes, MobileOps has saved Crounse countless hours, which equates to big cost savings overtime. Overall, MobileOps has proven to be an extremely easy and valuable tool to use for both vessel and shoreside users. Team members at Crounse Corporation encourage “other companies to take a serious look at MobileOps when making their decision regarding selection of a software package solution for their fleet.”
Crounse Vessel Pushing Barges
