COLUMBUS, OHIO, Aug. 28, 2013 -- A new technology from ARCOS, a company addressing accountability, transparency, and results for crew callout in a number of industries, recently replaced Empire District Electric Company's after-hours manual phone dialing process for calling crews with the Software-as-a-Service Suite that automatically calls and assembles crews to restore power and fix water leaks.
Empire, an investor-owned utility providing electric, natural gas and water service to several mid-contenent states, purchased the ARCOS Suite to reduce outage times as part of "Operation Toughen Up," an initiative for strengthening the company's delivery system. Empire plans to have the ARCOS Suite in place this summer for approximately 240 electric workers and water servicemen.
Empire's manual callout process requires service areas to send callout lists to its contact center every two weeks. The callout order for crews is based on work agreements. When Empire's outage management system reports an outage, dispatchers in the contact center use lists in binders to find and call linemen who can respond to trouble.
With ARCOS in place, the contact center will initiate an automated callout with the click of a button. Crews will be alerted in seconds to the trouble via mobile phone, pager, home phone, text, or email. The automatic ARCOS call for crews electronically mimics the callout process and rules exactly as outlined by the agreement with the IBEW.
About ARCOS, Inc.
Twenty-one of the top 25 U.S. utilities rely on the ARCOS® Callout and Scheduling Suite. When the power goes out, a gas leak is reported or another emergency occurs, the award-winning, SaaS-based ARCOS Suite instantaneously finds, assembles and tracks repair crews, reducing outage interruptions and improving restoration time for electric, gas and power plant utilities. Visit www.arcos-inc.com or call 614-396-5500.
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