Ruter As, Norway, school transport and special transport services
"An electronic certification solution with Trapeze CERT6 has meant financial savings, simpler routines and shorter processing times for the benefit of all the parties involved. "
Roger Hansen System Administrator, Ruter As
THE COMPANY
As a purely administrative company with about 90 employees, Ruter As. was created as a result of a merger between Oslo Sporveier and Stor-Oslo Lokaltrafikk. Via contracts with independent companies, Ruter manages the operation of the public transport services in the Oslo and Akershus region. Ruter and the transport operators carry around 270 million passengers annually, over approximately 70 million kilometres.
In addition to public transport services such as bus, tram and T-rail, Ruter administers the coordination of school transport and special transport services throughout the Akershus region. The company is therefore responsible for the transport of 3,500 students annually, to and from schools in the entire region
THE PROBLEM
Every year Ruter receives up to 4,000 applications concerning school transport for sick or disabled students from the roughly 400 primary, secondary and adult schools in Akershus. The school secretaries at the individual schools apply on behalf of the students and, until now, the applications have been filled out by hand and sent on paper forms to Ruter. Before the processing of the applications could begin, Ruter, who is responsible for the certifications, typed in the information so that it could be used later in connection with the planning and allocation of transport.
By making the application and certification procedure electronic, Ruter will be able to save a large number of working hours spent on manual typing work.
“We used to have to hire extra staff for a couple of weeks in the period just before the start of the school year. In addition, the hand-written applications were often incomplete or difficult to read, which delayed processing,” explains Ruter’s system administrator Roger Hansen, who continues:
“We therefore wanted an electronic system that could ensure that we received all the necessary information from the outset and that the information could also be integrated into the Trapeze PASS booking system.”
In order to achieve success with an electronic system, it was important for Hansen that the system did not place too many demands on the IT system and users at the schools.
“It would be easier to implement the change if an electronic solution could also facilitate the work at the schools. A simple construction and familiar interface were, therefore, keywords in our search for an electronic certification system” Hansen explained.”
THE SOLUTION
In order to meet these requirements, Ruter selected the Trapeze CERT6 certification system. The system is a Web-based solution developed for decentralised certification tasks and it allows for both internal and external users.
“The choice of CERT6 was, to a great extent, due to the system’s user-friendly characteristics. Our staff can easily send the information to the Trapeze booking system, while the web-based platform makes it easy to use the system at the many external locations,” said Hansen.
Another decisive factor for Ruter’s choice of CERT6 was based on Norwegian legislation. In order to obtain permission to collect and process health information, the Norwegian Data Inspectorate imposes stringent demands for confidentiality and security.
“It was important that we could use CERT6 in connection with encrypted data lines. In addition, the system allows us to manage access to health information so that we can guarantee confidential data processing,” said Hansen
IMPLEMENTATION
Ruter approached Trapeze in January 2006 with their definition of the problem and their requirements for an electronic solution. From this point on, things moved quickly towards finding the right product and implementing it.
“The project took place very quickly. The actual implementation process lasted about two months and was carried out without any major difficulties. We had a complete solution ready on 1 June 2006,” said Ruter’s transport consultant.
However, the solution was not fully operational until the 2006/07 school year, since all the users at the nearly 400 schools had to be introduced to the new system first. Hansen tells how the Trapeze staff contributed to the quick and effective training:
“Two of us were trained by Trapeze to be able to train case officers and almost 400 school secretaries in Akershus. Thanks to the structure of the collaboration with Trapeze, we achieved a very effective utilisation of resources in the implementation and training phases with a minimum of disruption to the users’ daily routine.”
positive and helpful,” concludes Per Erling Larsen.
THE RESULTS
CERT6 has fully lived up to Ruter’s expectations. Among other things, the system has produced financial savings and faster case processing.
“By skipping the manual entry of applications, we free-up a lot of resources in the daily routine and we avoid the expense of extra personnel at the beginning of the school year. We also reduce the time required to process cases, since we can begin as soon as we receive the application,” explains Roger Hansen, adding:
“In general, staff has been pleased with the system, which has certainly made things easier for both our internal and external users.”
