The University of Edinburgh

Web Based Technology generates Substantial and Quantifiable Benefits

Winners of the e-business Category PFM Awards 2004

The University of Edinburgh is using 21st Century IT to help manage the estates and buildings at its historic 530,000 square metre site in the heart of the city. The EBIS Estates & Buildings Information System, based on market-leading technology supplied by Mass, is being used to provide facilities, financial, space and asset management information to all departments via the Intranet.

The University estate comprises more than 200 major academic buildings, plus residential halls and flats for more than 5,000 students. In addition, there are 1,700 hectares of open space used as playing fields, agricultural land and landscaped areas. The Estates and Buildings Department manages these properties and land, and employs 750 staff, plus external contractors.

The development of EBIS in partnership with Mass stemmed from the University’s requirement for a fully integrated and accurate estates database.

EBIS comprises a range of fully functional web-based applications for Space Utilisation, Room Booking, Building Maintenance Management, Helpdesk and Project Cost Accounting. Wireless technology is also being used to track estates and buildings information remotely.

EBIS is generating considerable business benefits for the University in terms of increased efficiency, improved customer service and cost savings.

Operational achievements with EBIS to date include:

• System access by 100 core users and 700 authorised web users
• 98% of recurring room requests made via the Internet
• 80% of all reactive job requests carried out via the Internet
• 530,000 m² of space being managed
• Over 830 drawings in the system
• More than 51,000 helpdesk jobs processed annually
• Over 16,000 purchase orders and invoices issued annually
• 600,000 rooms booked
• Over 400 active projects managed

These achievements emphasise the very widespread adoption of the Internet-enabled system, which has resulted in considerable benefits all round:

• Information is readily available to all staff
• Accurate and up-to-date data is assured
• Customer service has been improved
• The system is state of the art, easy to use and requires minimal support
• Working practices have been improved

Furthermore, EBIS has generated some major strategic benefits:

• The University has targeted to reduce its occupied space by 10% by using EBIS
• Strategic information can be generated much more quickly and easily
• Stock levels have been reduced giving an initial saving of £80,000
• Substantial savings on the cost of paper and forms hav

   

   

   

  

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