Actions speak louder than words. This is true whether we’re discussing the value TRACK and myTrack bring to our customers’ daily lives—or MServ, our global managed service offering.
This is why we love to share real-world examples to demonstrate the value customers gain when they level up with MServ.
In a recent webinar, Kelly Hall, MServ Operations Manager, presented such examples, including:
- $1.9 million cleared out of a customer’s system to reduce risk exposure in the first three months.
- $75,000 identified in skill step-up for one client in the previous month.
- $276,000 in savings over 6 months due to missed badge events.
- $300,000 in improper per diem charges
Want to learn more? First, let’s dig into MServ and some of the examples Hall highlighted in the webinar.
What is MServ?
MServ is a global managed service offering that is available to new and existing customers. By employing MServ and its internal experts, customers remove themselves from any administrative challenges associated with their TRACK or myTrack daily processes. This allows them to focus on their organization's core business and high-value deliverables.
MServ experts can deliver:
- Local support to drive optimization in daily processing and provide best practices.
- Collaborative vendor partnering: MCi experts will partner with vendors to provide training, daily process support, and back-end process assistance to enhance the relationship on the owner’s behalf.
- Real-time data on performance and compliance to drive fact-based decisions, standardize contracting strategies, and enhance vendor partnerships.
- Operational reviews, maturity curve assessments, and benchmarking to further the trajectory with TRACK, ensuring progress and value opportunities.
With MServ, customers employ TRACK experts whose sole focus is managing the process. Customers typically experience significant improvements in areas such as faster vendor onboarding, reduced material leakage, override rejection, and allocation cycle time.
MServ in Action: Governance and Enterprise Standardization
One of the best practices when implementing myTrack or TRACK is standardization across locations, especially when you have vendors working at multiple sites. Keeping consistency and process standardization for each location should be governed the same way to minimize problems. The MServ team will review how each site is handling its processes and make the proper recommendations towards that standardization.
Case in point: we found one vendor was entering per diem through the material module at one location and per diem through the labor module at another business location. “This makes it very difficult for a vendor to manage their accounting system and [for the] customer as well,” Hall says. Not having this consistency makes it difficult to compare apples to apples when looking at Insights for process improvements.
The MServ team met with stakeholders and made the proper recommendations to standardize all per diem in the labor module.
Other issues may arise regarding standardization around lump sum. Customers could mitigate their risks by implementing a lump sum process across multiple locations.
The team also reviews pay formulas. One deduction Hall and the team find regularly is lunch. She explains: “We revisit contracts to make sure that the pay formula is set up and the schedule assigned is the current lunch deduction.” They study the contracts and ensure the system’s setup is correct.
How MServ Helps You Partner with Vendors
The vendor timekeepers use the system the most, so their input is essential.
"We put a lot of focus on that vendor partnering piece to ensure that the vendors fully understand their day-to-day processes and we're always there to help and guide them. If it takes us traveling to their home office and their environment, then that's what we do,” Hall says.
On multiple occasions, we have had our MServ consultant visit the vendors’ timekeepers at their work locations. The goal in visiting a vendor in their environment is to understand their pain points. The MServ team asked, “Are you not using imports? Where is your frustration? What part of TRACK takes the longest?”
What we typically find is that it's not always the process and TRACK. The challenge could be related to how the vendor gets information, such as their timesheets from their foreman, lack of understanding of the order of operations, or a host of issues.
“We looked at how they were integrating their day-to-day process along with TRACK, and we made those recommendations. Before we knew it, they were begging for us to come back,” Hall says.
Identifying Open Liability with MServ
One of the first things the MServ team does when working with a customer is to sort through the data. The team studies the customers’ contracts and gets to know their processes.
While doing this for one client, the team found thousands of hours that weren't allocated. “This is a big red flag for us as MServ consultants because we know any hours unallocated, no matter how old, is a risk,” Hall says. The team aims to close the gaps and get rid of the risks.
The team cleared out those hours, which resulted in $1.9 million being cleared out of the system and reducing risk exposure. This occurred within the first three weeks the MServ team began working with the customer.
As part of this process, the team looks at the skill step-up dashboard. “We don't just leave it at the surface level of what's not allocated, what's not authorized or accepted. We dive deep into the data, and we look at what is the skill step-up percentage. Is it way too much for that period?”
According to Hall, the team identified $75,000 of skill step-ups for one client in the previous month. The MServ team shared the information with the customer, who was surprised by the number and inspired to act.
Reducing Process Lag Time
The MServ team regularly looks at process lag time. They review how long a timekeeper takes to allocate, accept, and authorize. If red flags arise, the MServ team goes to the vendor to see how they can help.
Hall explains: “A lot of times, we find that it is just a hiccup in their process, or maybe they just don't know about an import,” Hall says. “Within the first month of working with one MServ client, we were able to reduced the allocation piece down from six days to four.”
How MServ Helps to Reduce Override Rejection Rate
Like others on this list, understanding overrides requires diving into the data. The purpose is to learn the vendors’ processes and recognize the number, percentage, and rejection rate of overrides. The MServ team learns to recognize overrides that shouldn’t have been paid.
During the first month of partnering with one client, the MServ team reduced overrides by working with the vendor on schedule changes. They noticed that the vendor managed schedules via an override instead of changing the schedule as recommended.
The team also increased the override rejection rate by 25% for the same client. They won't have to pay 25% of the extra hours. As importantly, the team worked to change habits so the issue wouldn’t arise again.
Another MServ client saw $276,000 in savings over six months by reducing their missing badge events. How was this discovered? “We looked at their missing badge event overrides, we monitored who it was happening to, we monitored the crew, and the vendor,” Hall says.
The team offered training related to missed badge events. For example, when there are no badge events in the system, there's no record of this person being on-site, or they didn't badge out. That makes it very difficult to verify whether a person was there for the hours they claim.
Ensure Material Module Accuracy with MServ
Users of myTrack and TRACK sometimes make the material module a catch-all for anything that doesn’t fit into labor. Therefore, the MServ team reviews the material module and receipts to ensure they only include contractual items that procurement has negotiated as part of the contract.
“We don't just take that receipt at face value. We will do our due diligence and go down those rabbit holes and make sure that when we hit that end, that that receipt is true, and that it's billable and contractual,” Hall says.
The team has also discovered unbillable items, including breakfast and lunches for crews, tools, equipment, etc. A more significant find–double billing by vendors. The team identified $300,000 in improper per diem charges that were not billable for one client.
Take the Next Step with MServ
MServ’s expertise and industry-leading best practices can streamline operations, ensure compliance, and drive efficiency. Seize the opportunity with MServ to unlock your organization’s potential and propel your business toward success.
Read our solution brief to learn more now.
You can also contact us today to learn more and embark on your journey toward operational excellence. Contact your Sales Representative or Account Executive today.
