Supporting Transport for Night Shift Workers in BPOs

Location: 
Manila, Philippines (Muñoz, Insular, Mandaluyong, Pasig, Quezon)

BACKGROUND

Inspiro (formerly SPi CRM) is a leading global BPO provider with over 12,000 employees in the Philippines. The employees working the night shifts were affected in their commutes by the transportation limitations due to the pandemic, such as travel restrictions for non-essential workers and curfews. To support its contact centre agents and staff working the night shifts, the company provides shuttle services for its employees to travel to and from the office safely and conveniently.

This service is delivered jointly with Toyota Motor Philippines (TMP). TMP manages the supply and deployment of vehicles, actively monitors the service on a regular basis, and provides on-site and technical support when required.
“We are pleased with SWATBiz as we could use its platform to ensure our employees’ welfare and support our business requirements. SWAT Mobility allowed us to automate our transportation support services and gave us the flexibility to find better ways to support our employees through data analytics.”

- Ryan Laureano, Chief Administrative Officer and General Counsel, Inspiro

‍THE CHALLENGE

Prior to working with SWAT, transport planning for Inspiro was done manually by its internal staff. The company shuttles about 450 employees daily, and the company staff had to manually record for each employee taking the transport - the start and end time of their shifts, and their pick-up and drop-off points. At times, the employees themselves had to call in to let the company know these details. The staff then manually assigned each employee to a geographical zone and allocated the vehicles based on the zones. Such service planning across multiple shifts was complex due to the large number of pick-up and drop-off points, and the staff spent many man-hours settling the daily staff transport schedule.

The company also had to liaise with several transport operators [i.e. bus and vans] to manage the supply of vehicles, which was cumbersome, and sort out administrative tasks such as reporting and reconciliation of ridership.

Inspiro sought to improve the cost-efficiency of its employee shuttle service. It engaged SWAT with the intention to streamline manual operations and save costs through the optimisation of transport. Its main goals with digitalising employee transportation involve:

  • Overall reduction of vehicle (i.e. bus and van) count
  • Improvement in vehicle utilisation
  • Automate route planning
  • Reduce man-hours required to complete administrative reporting and reconciliation

THE SOLUTION

Inspiro worked with SWAT Mobility on optimising its employee transport service for five of its facilities in Metro Manila, implementing door-to-door services without increasing the journey time for the employees. 97% of Inspiro’s employees arrive punctually at work every day despite transport limitations due to the pandemic, helping the company to maintain productivity of their operations.

The company was able to deploy vehicles more efficiently, based on the demand of passengers. SWAT’s technology allowed them to reduce the vehicle count whenever possible, with the company seeing vehicle reductions up to 70%.

The company also greatly reduced the headcount of staff planning and managing transport by 87%, using SWAT’s system which automatically generated routes and tracked the ridership and utilisation. The service reports can be accessed easily, saving the time required for the company to calculate and obtain the numbers.

These improved efficiencies resulted in significant cost savings for the company, from reducing the man-hours spent on planning transport, to improving the utilisation of vehicles and deploying less number of vehicles.

Happier Employees

Inspiro’s employees now find it very convenient to get to work. Using the SWATBiz application to book rides gives them greater autonomy over their commutes. They are highly satisfied with the solution, on average giving the app a rating of 4.72 out of 5.

  • Real-time tracking with the app, location of buses and ETAs available
  • Empower employees
  • Better attract and retain employees with more convenient transport
“(The app is) very easy to use. (It is) very convenient to go to work.”
“(I like the) flexibility of address and time. I get dropped off and picked up at the right time.”
“(The service is) very comfortable, useful and accurate. The driver is nice and careful (when) driving.”
- Satisfied passengers (employees) from Inspiro

PERFORMANCE IMPACT

83,000 rides and counting

98% of employees arrive to work on time daily

87% reduction in staff managing transport

Up to 70% vehicle reduction

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