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Serco Ryan - Mobile Sales System

(Field Force Automation)

Creating a new "mobile retail sales environment" is a new venture for Serco Ryan, a division of Trifast, one of the world’s leading fastener supply companies. Their target market would be tradesmen and the public and in order to offer a better level of service to these customers Serco Ryan would need to introduce the latest technology. This led to the development by Barcode-IT of a full mobile sales system for the range of over 900 fixing and fastening products stocked on the vehicle.

Each Mobile Sales Person would need to be able to operate independently and complete transactions in the field, often outside the range of the GPRS (mobile phone) system. As a result of this the system would need to operate in both independent and connected mode allowing sales to continue "out of range" but re-connect and upload new orders when back in range.

"Working with Barcode-IT enabled us to meet the tight timescale we needed to complete this project and the professionalism, enthusiasm and commitment given by Barcode-IT has been exemplary." says Simon Underhill, IT Operations at Serco Ryan. " Every project milestone was hit and valuable suggestions for the projects overall efficiency were offered by the development team, which had been very well thought out."

Application Overview

The van sales system uses PSC Falcon portable terminals and Zebra RW420 mobile printers, to automate the stock control and customer sales from the vehicle, with the terminal holding a full inventory of the van stock and regular customer details.  All of the van stock is bagged and barcoded, so the operator opens a new order for the customer and scans the barcodes for each product taken.  The system automatically keeps a running total and applies any special customer discounts due.  At the end of the transaction a receipt is printed out on a Zebra RW420 mobile printer and the van stock is updated to reflect the sales.  Once all transactions are complete, the terminal links to the main Serco Ryan warehouse via GPRS and relays the transactions to a central server.  This means that replenishments for the vans can be automatically picked, packed and shipped to the local depot, ensuring that the mobile sales vehicle is always fully stocked.

Technical Overview

The portable terminals are PSC Falcon 4220's running Windows CE.net [more] and the application was developed using Active Studio from TrakWare.  The advanced feature of the Falcon allows the touch screen to be used for all but barcode scanning data entry.  Active Studio allowed Barcode-IT to develop a powerful yet user friendly interface, with all the complex data validation and transfer system hidden from the user.  Barcode-IT are now developing many applications using Active Studio. For all printing requirements the Zebra RW420 mobile  printer was used, this rugged and versatile printer is specifically designed for in the field use and vehicle mounting.

How it started

Simon Underhill contacted Barcode-IT after seeing the web pages relating to Mobile printers. After a discussion with one of our consultants, it became clear that Barcode-IT had the skills and products to provide the whole solution for Serco Ryan's new mobile sales operation.  A detailed specification was written and following further consultation a "proof of concept" demonstration was arranged.  "I guess the demo exceeded the expectation" said Nigel Holloway, one of the Barcode-IT's sales consultants, "because we had an immediate GO from Serco Ryan's senior management".

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