“Sunshine Motors” is a large car dealership with 5 branches spread over the Melbourne Metropolitan area, with the Head Office located in Sunshine, the west of Melbourne. David Da Costa is the CEO of Sunshine Motors and heads up a team of branch managers, one for each branch. Each branch is organized into two departments, Sales and Service, and each department is run by a department manager. David plans on expanding the number of branches in the near future to become one of the states largest car dealership and service businesses. The servicing side of the business is really beginning to generate a good percentage of the business, and David plans on streamlining the operations of the servicing areas in all branches by undertaking a large IT project to computerize all aspects of this area. Currently each branch holds and orders parts for cars that they service, but David has located a property in North Melbourne that will be central to all branches, and plans to use this to build a major warehouse to centrally hold and distribute car parts to all branches on a daily basis or to fill urgent ad-hoc orders for parts fir just-in-time delivery to the branches.

Sunshine Motors has tasked your team to Manage the project to build this software system. The system is to allow the company to record client information – their details (for example name, address, contact details), vehicle details (for example make, model, colour, registration), and service history (for example service dates and odometer readings, details of the services performed separated into labour tasks and parts used, the mechanics involved). The system must also keep records of the mechanics employed by the company – their personal details, their qualifications and special licenses, time sheet information, emergency contact details, supervisor details. Additionally, the system will also record the inventory in the central warehouse and accept branch orders on a daily basis for parts to be required the next day, as well as urgent orders from branches for parts needed to complete a service on an ad-hoc basis.

It is also envisaged that members of the public will be able to buy part directly from the warehouse, either in person, or on-line via a new web-based ordering system, The system will need to be continually online to all branches and connect the branches to the central warehouse as well as to each other and head office.

The current system is a manual based system which has served the company well, but is now becoming outdated and causing bottlenecks due to the increased workload demand.

Description of the New System

Each branch has a pool of mechanics who are entitled to a rostered day off per fortnight and so the system must be able to produce a roster for the mechanics ensuring that there is always at least five mechanics working on a day and one mechanic available for an emergency call in, in the event of illness or extra work demand. Mechanics can also be rostered to different branches if necessary. When working on a vehicle, a mechanic can enter information into the system at any of the terminals to be placed in the workshop area; front office staff can enter information at any of two terminals in the front office; and roadway staff can enter details at an outside terminal on arrival of the client with their vehicle.

Mechanics are assigned to a Work Bay for the day, but may move between work bays for different work orders. Each workshop at each branch maintains a minimum of 7 Work Bays within the workshop area, though there are plans to expand this if the company can successfully implement this project and build expanded workshop facilities.

The company also provides loan cars to clients on request and so must keep information on when loan cars are available for clients and who has a loan car at any given time and for how long. Not all customers request loan cars, but when they book in a service they may request one, so the system needs to be able to respond with the details of when loan cars may be available.

Sunshine Motors needs to manage an inventory of parts and consumables in the central North Melbourne warehouse that the mechanics use for jobs. As mechanics order parts for jobs they may be allocated the system should decrement the inventory items as the orders are processed. The purchasing officer for the central warehouse needs to be able to check inventory levels at any time and order additional stock (typically via email to a supplier as necessary), though the new system should be able to automatically generate its own orders once the stock levels fall below a predetermined threshold. However the purchasing officer should also receive a warning email when this happens. The system should be able to handle up to 100,000 part numbers (a consumable also has a part number) and the purchasing officer to set the thresholds for the inventory levels for each part as they require. A part or consumable has a name, a number, a supplier and a minimum order quantity.

Each morning, the Service Manager will review the booked services for the next day. From this review a standard order of required parts will be sent to the warehouse for delivery that afternoon, or early next morning. In this way, mechanics can begin work on vehicles as soon as the owner drops them off using the standards parts delivered. If further parts are needed on an ad-hoc basis, this is handled by the mechanics using the parts ordering system associated with the particular service being undertaken.

When a Customer brings a car in for a service, they either come to the counter where a Service writer prepares the Work Order, or they can drop the car off and meed a roadway staff member outside with a portable entry device. The Service Writer and the Customer arrange for a time for the work to be completed and then the customer signs the Work Order and leaves. The Work Orders are arranged within the system in order of expected completion times.

When a Mechanic is free, they access the system and get assigned to the next Work Order available in the system. As soon as a Mechanic is assigned a Work Order, they indicate the available Work Bay they will be using, the Work Bay is then booked for the expected duration of the service, and a notification is sent to a Service assistant who retrieves the vehicle and drives it to the assigned Work Bay. The Mechanic then begins work on the vehicle. The Work Order will contain a number of standard Work Items corresponding to the particular service being undertaken, along with any specific faults noted by the customer. As each Work Item is completed the Mechanic checks these off on the system, so the system can keep track of the progress of the Work Order in case the Customer rings for an update on expected completion time.

As the Mechanic is servicing the vehicle, new parts may be needed for a particular Work Item. The Mechanic will log these parts in the system against the Work Item, and the system will also check the Inventory Database for availability. If the part is in stock then the System will adjust the quantity of these parts in the Inventory database and a notification is sent to a Service assistant to retrieve the part and deliver it to the required Work Bay. If the part is not stored locally then an urgent order will be sent to the parts warehouse, and a notice is sent to the Service Manager who will try and urgently get the part from the warehouse, or if necessary a supplier. If the part is unavailable then the Service Manager will notify the Customer about the delay and may have to arrange for a replacement car until the part arrives. The Service Manager will also notify the Mechanic who is servicing the vehicle of the outcome. This may require the Mechanic to be assigned to another Work Order until the Part arrives.

When a Mechanic finishes the items on the Work Order, this is entered into the System as complete. The Work Order is closed and a notification is sent to a Service Assistant who then retrieves the vehicle from the Work Bay, takes it to a Detailing Bay where it is washed and cleaned, then driven to parking bays to be picked up by the customer. When the vehicle is returned to the parking bays, the Service assistant enters this against the Work Order, and the Customer is notified that their vehicle is ready for collection. When the Work Order is closed, the Mechanic can then retrieve another Work Order from the System.

When the Work Order is closed, it is flagged as complete and the System automatically prepares an Invoice for the Work Order. The Invoice contains the standard costs for each of the Work Items, as well as the price of any new parts needed as the Work Items were being performed. It will additionally include labour costs. A total cost for the invoice is then generated and the Invoice is printed out.

A copy of the invoice is also sent to the accounts department.

Payment

When the Customer arrives to pick up their vehicle, they are given the Invoice which they can check, then payment is received and entered into the system against the Invoice. When an Invoice is fully paid, it is flagged as closed. In some cases, Sunshine Motors may allow an Invoice to be partly paid, in which case the Invoice remains Open until full payment is received. This may be for a term of up to seven days.

Some Customers (for example companies which maintain fleets of vehicles) have accounts with Sunshine Motors, and will receive a monthly statement through the post. These customers have longer terms, such as the end of the month in which the statement is issued.

When a customer payment is received, a copy of the payment is sent to the accounts department, where the payment is matched against the invoice and a receipt will be issued through the post, or via text message if the Customer has registered a mobile telephone number. Payment can be by cash, credit card or PayPal.

Regular reports need to be generated to list those invoices over their due dates that have not been paid.

Issues

A number of issues have arisen that have prompted Sunshine Motors to contract you to look into the develppment of this new system.

• It is difficult to keep track of the Work Orders during the day and thus it is difficult to answer customer phone queries on the progress of their service

• Work orders were not collated till the end of the day, thus it was difficult to keep track of the consumption or inventory on a day to day basis

• Manual checks had to be kept on inventory levels to make sure stock was available. If stock ran out this could be costly in terms of supplying the customer with replacement vehicles.

• As the number of customers has grown (and is expected to grow in future) it was sometimes difficult to keep track of the fleet or loan cars, and answer customer queries on when one would be available so they could book their service.

• Additionally, we need to keep better track of kilometers in our loan fleet so these can also be serviced in a timely manner.

• Delays in sending paperwork to our suppliers can cause delays in inventory processing and result in longer delivery times of stock.

• The level of paperwork is increasing and the accounts department is having trouble keeping up with the timely production of monthly statements, processing of payments and general financial reporting.

• With customers beginning to ask for different methods of payment such as email, PayPal etc, we need to look at incorporating this into our business processes somehow

Other Information

Sunshine Motors has a finance manager who must be able to extract information related to car services and bills paid (clients pay the front office staff on completion of a job) as well as invoices paid to suppliers, for parts ordered by the purchasing officer. The finance manager prefers to use Microsoft® Excel® and MYOB® for accounting activities.

Sunshine Motors has a marketing manager who needs to be able to set up mail out reminders to clients when their car might be coming due for a service and any special offers. The marketing manager would like to know if this could be incorporated into the new system.

There has been some consideration to giving mechanics a tablet computing device so that they can enter information more freely as they move around the workshop but there are concerns about the robustness of such devices (mechanics like to drop things) and the need for a local wireless area network – if possible this is desirable, but not mandatory.

Sunshine Motors needs an IT administrator to maintain the system, perform backups and set access permissions, for example.

The team, apart from the IT administrator, finance manager and marketing manager are generally fairly IT illiterate and so need very simple user interfaces.

Sunshine Motors has a client base of 300 clients but is hoping to grow this by 10%.

This project is quite large and will require a significant investment from the company. There is some opposition within the company from some stakeholders, particularly the sales managers at the various branches, however most of the service managers see the project as providing significant advantages.

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