ATC Group Services is a nationwide, full service environmental and geotechnical materials testing consulting firm. VP, Director-Geotechnical and CMT Services Scott Vinsant, learned about MetaField® from a competitor, and started using it about a year and a half ago to help with construction materials testing and within the company’s geotechnical divisions. As a full service laboratory providing materials testing services in their labs and construction materials testing in the field, ATC is dealing with a lot of data across multiple divisions.
MetaField has become the key to streamlining their processes and delivering greater efficiency to their team.
Efficient Data Collection and Reporting
ATC Group has more than 100 offices across the country and provides multiple services. They needed one platform to collect and report on data to help employees work smarter. “MetaField has been beneficial to our company and specifically helps us be more efficient. Having so many offices, we needed to consolidate the way we do things,” said Vinsant.
In the environmental sector ATC Group serves clients with petroleum and high risk constituent issues. They also help with due diligence and phase one environmental site assessments, industrial hygiene services to help companies handle asbestos, mold and other remediation issues, as well as safety compliance. On the geotechnical engineering side ATC does subsurface evaluations, providing foundation recommendations, including landfill and flat roadway work.
Vinsant chose MetaField to keep everyone on the same platform with a
uniform reporting structure. This way technicians, project managers and engineers are all looking at the same thing no matter where they go. With MetaField everyone is using the same type of reporting format and data collection. This includes photos, which is a big time-saver. Prior to using MetaField, field technicians would have to take the photo and make sure to attach it to the report, which they often forgot to do. With MetaField, they can upload photos right from their mobile device into the report.
“Data collection is certainly a key function for us, and we see a tremendous benefit the way you gather information in the field since we’ve been able to tailor, forge, and process now to the way we want it,” stated Vinsant. MetaField serves as a guideline to the technicians and other inspectors in the field, with automated functions so they can quickly and easily enter data and generate reports.
LIMS for Smart Communication Between Field and Office
MetaField’s
Lab Information Management System (LIMS) allows teams to track and manage field samples from beginning to end for analysis and reporting. This helps Vinsant’s team track full chain of custody from field to lab, with real time visibility and consistent reporting. MetaField offers the only fully integrated field and lab management software solution in the industry.
Vinsant’s team finds it easy to upload different information from ATC’s software programs used in the lab to the LIMS system so that technicians have instant access right on their mobile device. “LIMS is very valuable to us. The laboratory side connects with field data collection and reporting. We have the ability to see everything in MetaField without having to call the lab and find out what information they need in order to run their test in the field and compute their data,” Vinsant states.
Built by Industry Experts, For Industry Experts
In looking for collaboration tools, ATC Group sought a software company that could understand and support the unique requirements of construction and engineering. “We were looking for something that was really reflective of what our target was at the time, which was our construction services. We found that Agile Frameworks personnel had a good knowledge-base. They knew a lot of what we were talking about, where other software companies did not know the technical framework we needed. That was very helpful to us,” Vinsant said.
Additionally, Vinsant appreciates that the Agile Frameworks team is always ready to respond to ATC’s needs and requirements. “Agile has been very positive in helping to solve problems, and that’s a big selling point to me. We’ve used software in the past, and once they sell you the product they end the relationship there. But Agile is a living system, they continually serve us, and are trying their best to provide for our needs.”
Saving Costs Using MetaField
By helping ATC streamline key workflows, MetaField has improved the team’s efficiency and even allowed them to cut costs. “We’ve seen the efficiency of using MetaField and we save on costs. In a timeframe that it would take the technician to do the reporting and other field work, now we’re able to collect the data and then generate reports within half that time.”
Using MetaField also helps ATC Group save on administration costs. According to Vinsant, “I definitely know we have labor savings and that helps us dramatically. Before using Agile Frameworks we had more clerical needs, and we pretty much cut clerical needs out.”
Get Started
To learn more about how Agile Frameworks’ MetaField solution can help you to improve your efficiencies and help with data collection and reporting, download the MetaField brochure.
