Healthcare
After years of training and working 24-hour workdays, doctors and nurses still have only seconds to make a critical decision. Instant access to patient data is vital to patient diagnosis and treatment, and pen tablet PCs answer the call with portability and wireless capabilities. Caregivers can tap and view clinical history, treatments, medication, lab results, and insurance information. Learn more about mobile healthcare.
Retail
Sales reps stay in sync with busy store managers using mobile PCs. With just a tap, sales reps display or transmit vital data on store sales, pricing, products, and customer profiles.
Even with database access, there’s much more to pen computers for retail. Wireless capabilities provide real-time information, which is critical to successful retail. Instant updates. Shipping status. Pricing issues were resolved on the spot. A quick purchase order look-up. Expedited service requests.
No more calling back to the home office or taking hours or days to answer a customer’s question. Sales reps can focus time and energy on their customers — discussing product plans, promotions, taking orders, and growing the relationship.
Dallas-based 7Eleven sees the potential for mobile PCs to cut costs and improve productivity. The positive return on investment (ROI) justifies the investment even in the face of tight budgetary constraints.
7 Eleven has more than 5,800 stores in the United States alone and expects to save $3 million to $5 million annually by equipping field consultants and maintenance crews with Tablet PCs. Doing so replaces a more labor-intensive paperwork process that involves filling out lengthy store inventory surveys and rekeying inventory data into a database.
7-Eleven employees enter data into Tablet PCs using digital pens and upload everything to a central database. From there, everything can be immediately accessed by all maintenance crews and contractors. If a new machine is needed in a store, for example, all the information is available, including measurements, power supply, and plumbing. The data gathered will allow 7-Eleven to create an up-to-date profile of each store.
The smaller size and lighter weight of tablets make them more suitable than notebooks or laptops for data gathering, Walsh says. “When workers are trying to get a model or serial number from a Slurpee machine or a gas tank, there often isn’t a place to set a notebook down so they can type in the number,” she says. “They can hold a Tablet in one hand like a clipboard and input the data using the digital pen.”
7-Eleven is exploring other applications, such as attaching digital cameras to their Tablet PCs, so a field consultant can take a picture of a broken door hinge, for example, and write comments on the picture with a digital pen. They could then be sent to a maintenance crew for repair.
They’ll also boost the productivity of employees who spend hours in meetings or on the road by letting them take notes in digital ink and transferring them over a wireless network to desktop systems or to co-workers via e-mail. They won’t have to go through a stack of paper to find notes.
Transportation
Trucks are a trucker’s office, warehouse, home, and livelihood. With a pen tablet PC, a truck can also be a profit center. Pen tablet computers with wireless WAN capabilities can capture and transmit a stream of real-time data like shipment status, tracking, and the best routes to destinations.
Truckers can use the data for traffic updates and up-to-the-minute ETAs. Companies, in turn, can manage fleets on an hourly basis, track mileage and fuel efficiency, increase delivery turnarounds, and meet delivery windows. Customer updates such as, “I think he’s somewhere between Seattle and San Jose,” become a thing of the past.
Consulting
BearingPoint, formerly KPMG Consulting, also sees potential for Tablet PCs to boost productivity, estimating its consultants could save 50 hours a year by using them to capture and access information during meetings and while traveling. In turn, that could save millions in compensation.
The company became interested in Tablet Computers when it saw the potential it had for its customers, including state agencies.
“They have many workers who are mobile, including people who do fieldwork and inspections,” says Jim Sideris, managing director at BearingPoint. “It’s suitable for people in the field who use clipboards and forms.”
As part of a pilot program, BearingPoint has deployed Fujitsu PC Tablet Computers running Microsoft Windows XP Tablet PC Edition to managers, consultants, and developers at Harrisburg, Pa., and Austin, Texas, offices.
“I think the Tablet PC is a legitimate replacement for the notebook form factor, and there will be a fairly rapid deployment in the consulting industry,” Sideris says. “This type of device gives [consultants] the ability to interact based on the pen feature.”
BearingPoint, which will likely deploy more Tablet Computers as notebooks are replaced in its regular upgrade cycle, also expects workers to use Tablets in meetings.
“Using a notebook at meetings to take notes is often considered disruptive and impolite,” Sideris says. “But Tablet PCs with a pen or stylus are analogous to writing on paper. You can capture notes as pen objects, then convert them to text later if you want. It saves a tremendous amount of time because you don’t have to document meetings.”
Insurance
For insurance reps, presenting and collecting data is an inescapable fact of their daily routine. And some days, the sheer volume of information can be overwhelming and extremely time-consuming. Pen tablet PCs not only put an endless supply of policy and premium information at an agent’s fingertips, but they also offer relief from tiresome form-filling and multiple data entries.
With the wireless capabilities of pen tablet PCs, a client’s data can be entered on the spot, and with a tap, uploaded to the company database. But Pen Computers also shine when it comes to some old-fashioned selling.
Going door to door, the easy portability of this flat PC makes quick work of presenting relevant information, whether agents are standing in a prospect’s foyer or sitting on the couch. For existing clients, the flexibility to review private property and casualty coverage versus premium amounts on the spot is both a time-saver and client-pleaser.
For corporate executives, quick access to coverage amounts on buildings, machinery, and key individual contributors—and the proverbial executive summary/analysis—is an invaluable selling tool. So, whether it’s a simple claims adjustment, automobile claim, or property and casualty claim, a Pen Tablet is the right computer for the task.
Public Utilites & Tablet PC
Allegheny Energy isn’t new to the notion of pen-based computing; it has been using WalkAbout pen computers running Windows 95 for five years. But the built-in handwriting-recognition capability of Windows XP-based Tablet PCs is proving to be a big draw, says Scott Rogers, operations systems technology manager at the Hagerstown, Md.-based electric utility. Earlier this month, the utility rolled out 500 XP Tablet PCs from WalkAbout Computers for its field crews, who will use them for work-management applications, such as reporting on repairs of electrical lines, Rogers says.
The XP feature that lets users rotate the screen for portrait viewing also makes it easier for workers to take notes in the field, he adds. Allegheny relies on software developers to write the applications.
Warehousing / Distribution
Think of the Pen Tablet PC as the ultimate safeguard for inventory assets. With the wireless LAN capabilities, for instance, stock workers, auditors, expeditors, supervisors, and managers can track, update and optimize inventories moment to moment. No matter how vast a warehouse or how complicated a distribution center is, pen computing puts every asset and everybody on the same page.
Gone are the days of walking from the office to a pallet for visual confirmation of kind and quality and then re-entering that data. The easy portability of pen computing eliminates those unnecessary redundancies and delivers “fresh” information. Efficient lost goods tracking. Accurate cycle counts. Optimal delivery methods. With pen tablet PCs, companies can reduce costs, maximize profits and establish a reputation for responsiveness with their customers second to none
Your Market
Any market can benefit from mobile computing, pen computing, and even barcode scanning. Talk to our sales associates and we can help you.
Surplus Mobility provides virtually any type of hardware with a full complement of connectivity options. New, refurbished, and previously leased equipment is available including:
Pen-based computers
Tablet PCs
Handheld devices such as barcode scanners
Vehicle-mounted computers
Portable terminals
…and more!
Contact us about trade-ins or buying computing hardware just coming off lease. We can help you liquidate those leased devices. If you have any stock to sell, we are always looking to purchase quantities of Stylistics, Points, Tablet PC’s, other Pen Tablets, or even Notebook computers. We do all testing, refurbishing, cleaning, sealing, and packaging on all our items before we ship.
Our mission is to provide innovative mobile solutions to allow businesses and individuals to effortlessly access, create, analyze, and share information anytime, anywhere.
