WO2006077280A1

WO2006077280A1 - Method and system for arranging replacement and maintenance services

Info

Publication number: WO2006077280A1
Application number: PCT/FI2006/000019
Authority: WO
Inventors: Hannu Niemitalo; Pekka PÄKKILÄ; Perttu PÖYHTÄRI
Original assignee: Pancomp Electronics Oy
Priority date: 2005-01-20
Filing date: 2006-01-20
Publication date: 2006-07-27
Also published as: FI120563B; FI20050059A; FI20050059A0

Abstract

The method for arranging replacement and maintenance services according to the invention is characterised in that the maintenance objects (Rl, R2) are provided with readable tags (I1, I2, I3) identifying a replaceable article or maintenance operation (A1, A2, A3), the tag (I1) corresponding to the article (A1) or maintenance operation is read at the object (R1) as a need for replacement or maintenance arises, and the read data (C1) is sent to the management system (1) for obtaining the information about said need of replacement or maintenance. An order or instruction to deliver said article (A1) or maintenance operation to said object (R1) may be produced automatically in the management system. The invention concerns also the corresponding system which includes advantageously a mobile data acquisition system (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, L1) in which the tags are read by the terminal equipment (L1) operating in the system.

Description

METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR ARRANGING REPLACEMENT AND MAINTENANCE SERVICES

FIELD OF THE INVENTION The invention is related to a method for arranging replacement and maintenance services. The invention may be applied in the field of real estate or facility services.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

For example, the operation and service modes in the real estate service and building management sector have been developed fast during the recent years. Companies dedicated to the field offer their customers a wider range of real estate and facility services which may include cleaning including taking care of sanitary facilities and supplies, taking care of social and presentation facilities and supplies or office supplies, e.g. copy centers or office supplies stocks. The portion of replacement or supplies services is increasing in this kind of activities. As the activities of companies in this sector are often quite wide-scaled and comprise a large amount of customers and buildings and facilities to be maintained, the management of replacement and maintenance services becomes problematic.

Similar needs and problems, to large extent, concern also replacement and maintenance services related to primary activities of industries and other establishments. For the time being, as far as we know, there are no advanced technical solutions for replacement and maintenance services by which the management of such activities could be significantly improved.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION An object of the invention is to present a method and system by which the arranging replacement and maintenance services is improved in the field of real estate and facilities services and in the factories and various establishments.

To achieve this object, a method for arranging replacement and maintenance services is characterized in that which is defined in the characterizing part of independent claim 1. An embodiment of the method is defined in dependent claim 2.

To achieve this object, a system for arranging replacement and maintenance services is characterized in that which is defined in the characterizing part of independent claim 3. Some embodiments of the system are defined in dependent claims 4 to 7.

By means of the solution of the invention the information about any need of replacement or maintenance is made immediately available to the management system and staff responsible for the system. At the same time, the possibility is avoided that the

SUBSTITUTE SHEET (Rule 2©) information coming in a conventional manner through the organisation is lost or changed on the way or is not precise and needs further details the obtaining of which again through the organisation would be slow and troublesome.

Moreover, the solution of the invention is especially advantageous as realized in connection with a data acquisition system based on the utilization of tags and being for other management and control purposes, for example for supervising the work of employees and collecting the information related to it.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION QF THE DRAWINGS The invention and some of its embodiments are described in further detail in the following with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which:

Fig. 1 presents schematically a possible realization of the system according to the invention;

Fig. 2 presents schematically an example of placing readable tags in a system according to the invention;

Fig. 3 presents another example of readable tags in a system according to the invention; and

Fig. 4 is a flow chart presenting an embodiment of the method according to the invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

In the system of Fig. 1, objects Rl and R2 of a replacement or supplies service are, for example, rooms in a building Bl of a company Fl in which building a service company takes care of real estate and facilities services. The services may include cleaning and with it taking care of sanitary facilities and supplies, taking care of social and presentation facilities and supplies or office supplies, e.g. copy centers or office supplies stocks.

In the room Rl of Fig. 1 there is a rack or cupboard Hl in which article Al, e.g. toilet tissue, is kept. In the room R2 there are racks or cupboards H2 and H3 in which articles A2 and A3 are kept, respectively. In connection with the racks for certain articles there are readable tags II, 12 and 13, e.g. RFID tags, respectively. A maintenance person Pl has a portable, in a mobile system operating terminal device Ll which may be at the same time a device which is in connection with a management system and is used for controlling the work and for supervising and recording working hours.

Observing that there will soon be short of article Al at the object Rl, the person Pl reads with his or her terminal device the RFID tag Il corresponding to the article Al. The terminal device reads from the tag a code Cl which may be a 64-bit binary code. The

SUBSTITUTE SHEET fRwte 26) terminal device Ll communicates through a telecommunication network 5, in this example a GSM network, with a control unit 3 in such a way, for example, that it is programmed to establish from time to time a connection to the control unit 3 and to receive from and, respectively, send to it information. With this kind of communication, the terminal device sends to the control unit data including the code Cl read from the tag II, as is indicated by D(Cl) in Fig. 1

The control unit 3, a management data base 4 available for it, and a data acquisition and service system 2 form a centralized management system 1. In this example there is only one data acquisition and service system but the same control unit 3 and the management data base 4 may serve several data acquisition and management systems, e.g. systems of several companies. Receiving data D(Cl) from the terminal device Ll, the central unit 3 connects to the code Cl further information from the management data base, e.g. the information of the company Fl and building Bl concerned, and the information of the terminal device Ll which was sending the code and the time tl when it was read or sent, and sends data S(Fl, Bl, Cl, Ll, tl) including at least this information to the data acquisition and service system 2 concerned. In the system 2, information and instructions corresponding to the code Cl have been saved according which the system interprets that an amount ml of articles Al mustbe delivered to the object Rl in the building^~Bl^"όf the company Fl. The system may produce automatically a corresponding order or instruction to deliver said article, as indicated by O(F1, Bl, Rl, Al, ml) in Fig. 1. The data acquisition and service system 2 may conduct this information also to staff taking care of the supplies service, and the staff takes care of the order or replacement of articles in some other way. Obtaining at the same time the information about the terminal device Ll and the person Pl who is using the terminal device, the system may send a response or instructions or the staff taking care of the system may contact the person Pl . The system 2 may at the same time produce e.g. the corresponding debiting information and save it for debiting the client concerned at certain times, for example. Moreover, the system 2 may keep and update information about consumption of articles at different objects, for example.

Fig. 2 presents a possible way of placing the tags in sanitary facilities, for example. In table 6 there are pictures indicating various articles Al, A2 and A3 and below them the corresponding tags II, 12 and 13 which include the corresponding codes Cl, C2 and C3. Despite of that, tag 14 is placed in the table under a symbol 7 indicating hurry, the tag 4 including a code C4 the reading of which after reading the tag and code of certain article give the information to the system that the articles concerned must be delivered fast to the object. Moreover, there is a symbol 8 in the table and below that tag 15 including a code C5 the reading of which after reading the tag and code of certain article cancels the order of the article concerned. The table may further include instructions and other information at 9. This kind of table is suitable for situations in which the employees' knowledge of language is not good and illustrative instructions help in doing things right.

In the same way as with needs of arranging replacement of articles, the solution of the invention may be used also for arranging maintenance services to the objects at which those are needed. In Fig. 3 an example corresponding to the example of Fig. 2 is presented concerning tags related to needs of maintenance services. In a room which maintainance service concerns there may be a table 15 in which symbols Kl, K2 and K3 indicate need to replace of a light bulb, need of a visit of a maintenance man and need of cleaning. Below them there are tags 16, 17 and 18 including the corresponding codes C6, Cl and C8, respectively. As in the table of Fig. 2, also here there are symbols indicating hurry and cancellation with the corresponding tags and codes and instructions or other information at 16.

Fig. 4 presents an example of a corresponding solution as a method. Describing the method, the example of Fig. 1 is referred at the same time. In the method, the objects of replacement services, for example the objects Rl and R2 of Fig. 1, are provided with tags II, 12 and 13 identifying the corresponding articles Al, A2 and A3 (step 10). A need of service - arising, the tag corresponding to the ^"article is read^" at the object, eig.the ϊ tag Il corresponding the article Al of Fig. 1 at the object Rl (step 11). The code Cl read from the tag is sent to the management system (step 12). In the management system, information S(Fl, Bl, Cl, Ll, tl) of the need to replace certain articles is formed in response to said code Cl (step 13). Further to the code Cl, the information includes in this example also the information of the company Fl and building Bl and the device Ll from which the information has been obtained, and the information of the time tl at which the code was read or sent. In response to the code Cl and other information connected with it, the management system may produce automatically an order or instruction to deliver an amount ml of the article Al to the object Rl in the building Bl of the company Fl (step 14).

The solution according to the invention may be combined with a mobile data acquisition system provided for supervision of staff moving around at various working objects and for collecting the information concerning it. A such data acquisition system is presented in the applicants earlier FI patent application 20040288. Realizing the method and system on the substrate established by a mentioned kind of data acquisition system is very advantageous because the most of the equipment needed already exist.

The tags may be RFID tags as presented above, but they may be also bar code tags, for example. Moreover, tags may be added to the system according to the invention which mean and give certain information about the conditions at the object, e.g. that a window was open at an object.

It is obvious that the tags may be placed at the objects in many other ways than described above. The tags may include also other information further to one code which is not interpreted into information until in the management system. The exemplary solution presented here in which there is only one code in the tags is advantageous in that that the corresponding information in the management system may be easily changed at need without changing the code or information in the tag. Interpreting the code and searching and combining other information with it and, further on, arranging the subsequent measures may be realized in various ways.

The invention may vary within the scope of the accompanying claims.

Claims

1. A method for arranging replacement and maintenance services, characterized in that: maintenance objects (Rl, R2) are provided with readable tags (II, 12, 13; 16, 17, 18) identifying a replaceable article or maintenance operation (Al, A2, A3; Kl, K2, K3); the tag (II) corresponding to the article (Al) or maintenance operation is read at the object (Rl) as a need for replacement or maintenance arises; and the read data (Cl) is sent to a management system (1) for obtaining information about said need of replacement or maintenance.

2. A method according to claim 1, characterized in that it further comprises that an order or instruction to deliver said article (Al) or maintenance operation to said object (Rl) may be produced automatically in the management system.

3. A system for arranging replacement and maintenance services, characterized in that it comprises: at maintenance objects (Rl, R2) readable tags (II, 12, 13; 16, 17, 18) identifying a replaceable article or maintenance operation (Al, A2, A3; Kl, K2, K3); and means (Ll) for reading the tag (II) corresponding to the article (Al) or maintenance operation as a need for replacement or maintenance arises and for sending the read data (Cl) to a management system (1) for obtaining information about said need of replacement or maintenance.

4. A system according to claim 3, characterized in that the tag (II) is an RFDD tag.

5. A system according to claim 3, characterized in that means for reading the tag include a portable terminal device (Ll) operating in a mobile system.

6. A system according to claim 3, characterized in that it comprises a mobile data acquisition system (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, Ll).

7. A system according to claim 3, characterized in that it further comprises a system provided for supervision of working hours and working performances of a staff.