A customer asks for spraying certificates, and the drawer is empty
A customer's assurance assessor wants to see the certificates for everyone who sprayed on the farm. Your operators hold spraying tickets, and some have tickets for other machinery or tasks. The certificates are in a drawer in the office, in a folder on your laptop, or on the operators' own phones. One operator's ticket is on his fridge at home.
Putting together what the customer needs takes an afternoon of phone calls. And in the process, you find one operator's registration or update is not current, which nobody noticed.
Why tickets and certificates get lost
Operators collect qualifications over years, from different bodies, and each has its own renewal or update arrangement.
- Certificates are issued on paper or by email to the operator, not to you.
- Some tickets do not expire, some need renewal, and some need ongoing updates or registration.
- New operators bring tickets from previous employers, sometimes not all of them.
- Seasonal and relief operators have their own sets of tickets.
- Customers ask for different certificates for different work.
Which tickets are required for which work, and what the renewal rules are, is set by the relevant bodies, the law and your own policies, and your adviser is the person to ask. We do not advise on it. What we build keeps track of what your operators hold and when things are due.
What lapsed or lost tickets cost
Operators move on, too. When someone leaves, their certificates often leave with them, and if a customer later asks who sprayed their fields two seasons ago and whether he was qualified, the answer should still be on file. Keeping the record after an operator leaves is a decision for your own data policy, but it has to be a decision rather than an accident.
An operator doing work without a current ticket that you or your customer require is a risk you do not want. Finding out from a customer's assessor is worse. Most contractors discover these gaps by chance.
Time goes on it too. Every customer request for certificates means searching. Every new operator means copying tickets into a folder that nobody looks at again. And allocating operators in peak season without knowing who holds what makes the planning slower.
A ticket record for every operator
What we build is a record of each operator's tickets, with copies, dates and reminders.
- Each operator uploads photos of their certificates from their phone. The certificate type, number, issue date and expiry are read from the photo and confirmed by a person.
- Certificates that need renewal or regular updates have their dates set, according to what you or the issuing body tell you.
- You get reminders well before a certificate expires, at intervals you choose, and so does the operator.
- The allocation board shows which operators hold which tickets, so you can see before assigning a job who is qualified for it, as you define it.
- For customers, you can produce a pack of certificates for the operators who worked on their farm, as a PDF or a link.
- Seasonal and relief operators get the same record, so their tickets are checked before they start.
| What | Before | With the ticket record |
|---|---|---|
| Certificate copies | Drawer, laptop, operators' phones | One record per operator |
| Expiry dates | Found by chance | Reminders ahead of time |
| Customer requests | An afternoon of phone calls | A pack in a few clicks |
| Job allocation | Memory | Tickets shown on the board |
The next customer request
A customer asks for the spraying certificates of everyone who worked on his farm this year. You pick the customer, the system lists the operators who did jobs there, and produces a pack with their current certificates. It is emailed in minutes.
Relief operators hired for a few weeks are handled the same way. Before their first day, they get a link to upload their tickets. You see what they hold, confirm it, and they appear on the allocation board only for the work you have decided they can do.
In the meantime, a reminder tells you that one operator's registration update is due in two months. He books it in winter, when he has time, rather than finding out in spring.
Are your operators' tickets tracked?
- Certificates are in drawers, laptops and operators' phones.
- You find out about expired tickets by chance.
- Customer requests for certificates take hours to answer.
- You are not sure which operators hold which tickets without asking.
- Seasonal operators' tickets are not checked before they start.