Escape Business Technologies


Broadband provides the backbone for improved customer service and operating efficiencies for technology company Escape Business Technologies

Best practice in: 	Broadband
Sector:		      Technology Services
Size of firm:		20 employees
Location:		      Aberdeen, Scotland
Website:		www.escape-tech.co.uk

Escape Business Technologies provides a range of technology services for its customers ranging from systems engineering projects and software development through to the installation of cabling to support IT systems.  


Objectives: 

Escape is based in Aberdeen with a second office in Inverness.  Its customers are mainly SMEs with up to 100 employees.  Escape needed a broadband solution that would provide secure on-line access for the company's staff and customers and enable them to improve customer service and internal operating efficiencies.


Solution: 

Escape has been using broadband technology for three years and currently has BT ADSL broadband connections with 1mbps download and 256kbps upload speeds in both offices. One of the company's first moves was to introduce a Virtual Private Network (VPN) to provide the secure on-line access that they wanted for their staff and customers through the VPN's encrypted channel to the company's network.  "Normally that type of access would have cost thousands of pounds.  However with ADSL it was possible to do very cheaply," says Mike Bain, Director and founder of Escape.  


Results: 

The VPN provides secure access to the company's intranet for staff whether working in one of the offices or remotely.  The intranet is the home of the company's internal knowledge base.  It contains information such as a technology database to support engineers in the field, the job allocation schedule for engineers and administrative tools such as online timesheets.  

The VPN also provides secure access for customers and suppliers to specific parts of the company's network through an extranet.  An extranet is effectively part of the company's intranet that is extended to users outside of the company.  "Customers can for example log onto the extranet to see the status of their job.  They are also able to access information such as the problems that they have had in the past and how they were addressed by Escape.  This is a real-time system which would not be possible without broadband."

The integration of these systems with the company's back-office systems has provided a high level of operational efficiency.  When an engineer opens a job request from a customer the time is automatically logged.  It is logged again when he closes the job and an email sent to the customer to notify them that the job has been completed.  Details of the time taken are available on the network for access by the customer as well as internally.  The job report is then imported into the accounting system where, after human validation, invoices are automatically produced and emailed to the customers.  "We are probably saving a week of man-time a month as a result of our back-office integration and again we would not be able to do this without broadband."

The company's proposal system for new projects has also been automated.  "For example if a proposal requires several components from our suppliers the system picks the best prices available for those components from our suppliers.  This is possible as the suppliers access our network through an extranet to update their prices on the network on a monthly basis."  When a customer accepts a job the system automatically produces purchase orders for the suppliers and allocates engineers to the work.  "This enables us to price jobs more effectively.  It also saves a lot of time in putting proposals together as we do not have to call each supplier to check prices.  I estimate that this saves us a few days a month.  It also saves the Finance Department time by automating the purchase order process."

Escape has recently introduced VoIP (voice over IP) to improve the effectiveness of its telephone communications and reduce costs. VoIP enables voice communications to be made via broadband instead of via standard telephone network connections.  "This means that we can seamlessly transfer telephone calls to Escape between our sites if necessary.  Calls between the sites are free because they are over the broadband connection.  This saves us about £400 a month in call charges."



Challenges: 

One of the challenges faced by Escape is the need to provide a fast and effective level of service to those customers based some distance away from Escape's offices.  For those customers also using broadband Escape is able to fix problems on their systems remotely.  "We are able to, through the use of appropriate software installed on both systems, gain direct access to their systems from our offices in order to fix problems without travelling to their premises.  This saves time for us and enables us to provide our customers with a faster response time.  It also means that we can offer remote customers such as those based in the Shetlands a similar level of support to that of our more local customers."


The last word: 

Broadband has provided the backbone for improved customer service and operating efficiencies.  "The main benefit is that we can work smarter and can have people doing things other than administration.  We can focus on customer service and sales."