How Ruggedized Devices Meet the Mobility Needs of Utility Workers

1. How Ruggedized Devices Meet the Mobility Needs of Utility Workers Utility workers are responsible for maintaining, managing, and ensuring the availability of city infrastructure, properties, and utilities. From water facilities, power stations, construction projects, transportation, to drainage systems, utility workers perform various duties to maintain the city's facilities for the benefit of its citizens. City utilities have a huge workforce spread across vast geographies. They always have cost and performance pressures and the need to improve operational efficiencies. Cities that want efficient infrastructure and better utilities management process must embrace mobile technologies. By investing in military-grade mobile devices like ruggedized notebooks and rugged smartphones, city administrators can save operational costs of maintaining a city, increase workers’ productivity, and reduce errors. Rugged devices are designed to get tough jobs done in the most demanding environments, whether they use them inside an office or in field operations. What are ruggedized devices? Rugged devices are capable of dealing with rough handling, shock, drops, humidity, temperature changes, pressure, vibration, and more such accidents. They have longer-lasting battery life and hot- swappable batteries. Ruggedized Android phones feature built-in front and back cameras, biometric and barcode scanners, NFC and RFID options, and more. Apart from the touchscreen, high-speed processor, and good resolution, rugged phones have Wi-Fi, LAN, and Bluetooth capabilities. Industrial-grade Windows notebooks and rugged Android phones are tested to meet the MIL-STD 810G certification and IP645 and IP68 standards. Here are the ways by which ruggedized devices meet the mobility needs of utility workers: 1. Inspections and Survey Every type of utility fieldwork requires inspections. Laptops and computers can’t be taken to the field for performing inspections. Ruggedized Android phones can be used by utility workers to enter data for the most complex inspections. Rugged handhelds help to eliminate paperwork, increase workers’ productivity, and reduce data errors and the need for supervisory review. Rugged mobile devices come with Global Positioning System (GPS) that enables accurate measurements, thereby fulfilling the surveying needs in the field. The built-in GPS in these devices helps to find and view maps and visuals in remote locations. 2. Real-Time Communication Utility and city infrastructure management workers consist of assessment teams, maintenance and repair crews, dispatch personnel, and more. They all need to communicate with each other for faster responses to customer service requests and timely completion of the work orders. Rugged devices have wireless, Bluetooth, and WLAN features that enable real-time status updates even in remote areas. 3. Workforce Effectiveness Workforce effectiveness increases when there is a good collaboration between colleagues, real-time communication with each other, reduced reporting, and documentation tasks. When utility workers

2. will use rugged devices in the field, they can work smarter, communicate better, and record tasks faster. With ruggedized handhelds with them, workers can access territory, product, and customer data while working in the field and perform better. 4. Worker Safety and Supervision Workers’ safety can be ensured with the use of rugged mobile phones. Managers could be informed about workers’ location through GPS. Data can be collected easily without going to hazardous locations through the use of smart sensors and ruggedized phones. Managers can supervise workers from their office in case of emergencies. Workers could immediately report incidents and accidents to meet compliance requirements. Conclusion Mobility is crucial for utility workers. Not all mobile devices warrant mobility enablement. As utility personnel work in the office as well as outside in extreme environments, so they need tough mobile devices to accomplish more. Equip your workers with Windows or Android rugged phones and ruggedized notebooks or laptops to help them work more efficiently, communicate consistently, reduce error rates, and save time with tough mobility.