September 30, 2016

Client Spotlight: University of Notre Dame

Think back to your days in college. The hours spent in class, the days spent researching and writing a paper for class, the good times spent with friends at on-campus events. Now imagine how different those memories would be if there was no electricity. Could class still even occur? How would your research get done? Which events would have been canceled?

It’s fairly likely that most, if not all, of these things would be made a lot more difficult or even impossible without the use of electricity. And it’s even more likely that college students don’t really even consider that. Without power, the University of Notre Dame, along with others, would be quite different.

The University of Notre Dame has been a part of the MAPCON family since 2011. The University uses MAPCON at their on-campus power plant. The plant supplies heating and cooling, hot water, potable water, as well as more than half of the electricity to the 1,265 acre campus, which means keeping their utility equipment up and running is crucial.

When Power Plant Maintenance Supervisor Joe Herman was first hired, he said the system the utilities department used for their maintenance was not at all user-friendly. Information from previous years was being kept with paper files and books. When searching for a CMMS, the first thing that caught his eye with MAPCON was the fact that the main focus of the software was the work aspect, as opposed to purchasing or accounting.

The main thing the power plant uses the software for is scheduling preventive maintenance tasks. According to Joe, being able to come in every Monday morning and run a report for all of the PMs scheduled for that week has been a huge time saver. Knowing what work lies ahead for the week allows him and his staff of 12 to manage their time accordingly. Also, being able to keep up with these tasks on a regular basis reduces downtime and repairs, which saves the plant money as well as time.

One of the features of their MAPCON system they especially appreciate is the email notifications. Each time a work request is submitted, supervisors from each shift receive an email letting them know about the work request. They also receive an email when a work order has been completed. This allows each supervisor to know exactly what work has been done, and what repairs are still outstanding.

Notre Dame’s on-campus power plant is a very important part of the University. It is critical that their equipment experiences as little downtime as possible, which is where MAPCON comes in. By scheduling preventive maintenance and notifying supervisors immediately of submitted work requests through MAPCON, Joe and his team are able to keep things running smoothly, and keep students’ electricity available.