MyWorkPLAN job shop software, from Sescoi, has made a big difference to the smooth running of the Kansas, U.S.A. based mold maker, SEKTAM of Independence, Inc. Formed in 1972, the company started by making tooling for the local Emerson Electric plant, but has now progressed to making injection and blow molds for the automotive and sports goods industries. Its molds are used to produce a wide range of products, including gas cans for Blitz USA, OEM car parts for Standard Motor Products, and building accessories for Red Devil.

<< I can now produce a quotation in less than 30 minutes, which is a reduction of about one hour per job. Over the year it saves three months work, giving me more time to get extra business. >>
Chris Moore, President of SEKTAM

The company employs 12 highly skilled people, so efficient use of resources is of paramount importance. Before installing MyWorkPLAN software Chris Moore, President of SEKTAM, used to produce all the documentation to run the factory by hand. He says, “I was tired of writing quotes, recording jobs in a log book, creating invoices, and managing times on the back of job cards – everything was manual and it had to change.” He evaluated several job management systems and was extremely impressed with the MyWorkPLAN online presentation. “It was really cool, and ideally suited to the one off work we do.”

The company usually has around 20 jobs going through its factory at any one time, and completes between 400 and 500 projects every year. Some tools are delivered the same day, while the more complex mold builds can take 8-10 weeks. Starting with the quotation, Chris Moore uses his experience to calculate the labor hours and the material required for each job. MyWorkPLAN puts all the information in a quotation template, produces a pdf file for the customer, and records all the information in its database. “I can now produce a quotation in less than 30 minutes, which is a reduction of about one hour per job. Over the year it saves three months work, giving me more time to get extra business.”

Once SEKTAM has been awarded the business, MyWorkPLAN enables the automatic creation of a sales order, which contains the hours estimated for the job, the material required and notes for manufacturing. Because the company employs skilled personnel, it is unnecessary to produce a detailed list of operations. Chris Moore adds, “This is a great improvement on what we were doing before as, previously, there was no continuity between quotations and sales orders, meaning that we had to go back through our records to find the information. As well as automatically creating the sales order, MyWorkPLAN produces an order confirmation for the customer and prints out the notes for the job which go in a book on the shop floor for our engineers to refer to.”

To keep track of job times, SEKTAM has a touch screen terminal on the shop floor. The engineers log onto each job so that time spent is automatically recorded. It also has a MyWorkPLAN terminal in its engineering office, so that design hours can be recorded too. Chris Moore says, “I can now find the hours spent on a job with one mouse click. That way, if we are running near to or over the allotted hours I can go down to the shop floor to see if there is a problem and hurry production along. Similarly, for the jobs which are just labor and materials, I can keep track of how much has been used and advise the customer of the cost as the job progresses.”

MyWorkPLAN creates the invoices for SEKTAM, listing the work done on each job and calculating the hours and material used. Chris Moore comments, “Previously we were up to 60 days behind on our invoicing. Extracting and calculating the hours from the job cards used to be very time consuming as there could be 1000 hours spread across 20 or 30 cards. Now it is all done automatically. Our customers really like the prompt invoicing and, of course, we get paid quicker.”

SEKTAM finds the software easy to use and is very impressed with the quality of the support it gets from Sescoi. Chris Moore says, “The installation was straightforward. We then loaded quite a lot of historical data into the system, which we hired someone to do for us. Sescoi’s engineers helped us to get this completed and customized the system to suit our needs. In my opinion, the support is second to none, problems are resolved on the spot - I cannot speak too highly of the service we get.”

As well as saving about 3 months work, installing MyWorkPLAN job shop software has greatly reduced the stress put on the company by manual record keeping. Now time overruns can be spotted and fixed as they happen. Previously excess hours were only detected after the job had been completed. Chris Moore concludes, “MyWorkPLAN makes us work smarter. It has improved our customer relations - accurate information is available instantly and we now produce professional looking documentation. We also generate three redundant backups for all of our data. Previously, with paper records, we would have had a serious problem if we had been hit by a tornedo. Put simply, we have modernized!”