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FREDOM for Bucks FRS
Buckingham Fire and Rescue Service Station Manager Doug Gruchy talks to BAPCO Journal about a new system that aims to dramatically cut down the time spent on administration work and allow more time to be spent working within the community.
One of the most commonly voiced concerns about the emergency services is that too much time is spent on paperwork and not enough time on the streets. Politician after politician talks about their commitment to getting personnel from behind their desks and out in the community. Buckinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service are starting to implement a system that will ensure that their firefighters will be able to do just that.
The new system will enable firefighters to do a lot of administration work – which would usually takes up valuable shift time in the office – while out on the job. Using a new PDA-based web-browsing system, personal will now be able to update the database from the street using electronic versions of the same paper forms they would have had to fill in from behind a desk. The system – called FREDOM (Fire and Rescue & Enforcement Data On the Move) – will not only save time from administration work but will also allow Buckinghamshire FRS to spend more time actively working within the community to help reduce fire risk by carrying out fire risk assessments on homes and sites as well as carrying out fire safety audits.
Station Manager Doug Gruchy, the Technical Fire Safety Officer for Buckinghamshire, believes the new system will not only be of enormous benefit to his service but could be a very useful guide for other services thinking about introducing similar systems. “We have been looking at introducing an improved database system for some time and have spent many months looking at potential solutions, talking with companies who could potentially supply us with the infrastructure.”
Eventually the company they chose was Northern Ireland-based Consilium, as business development manager Antony Davies explains, “We were able to offer a fully mobilised fire inspections solution combined with an integrated back office database. The database will then be used to store all current fire related data and provide this information to inspectors as required.”
The benefits are numerous, as Antony notes, “With this, information is readily available in the field without a paper based system; the system information is always current; and as forms must be fully completed no data is missing (mandatory fields can be enforced on electronic forms). Furthermore single entry of data saves time and money so more inspections can be completed in less time and a paperless system cuts stationary costs to the fire authority. Finally, Consilium is working in partnership with Bucks Fire, tailoring the solution to their specific requirements. Bucks Fire and Rescue can design much of the solution themselves to fit in with their own working practices.”
A further benefit of the web-based system is where there were previously three databases unlinked, there will now be one unified database from which information can be accessed or added to. Doug outlines the potential this can have for the service. “The streamlining of the process will allow the service to spend more time out in the community carrying out fire risk assessments and audits. This should reduce the amount of call outs the service have to attend for fires that could have easily been avoided had the risk been spotted during an inspection.”
Part of the remit for this tender was that replicas of the existing paper process had to be available and able to be transmitted to the database electronically. “We wanted to use our current system and make it mobile rather than adapt to a new system that was someone else’s and would take time to adapt to.”
The system is to be launched on March 31 and Doug says that while there is only a short implementation time the simplicity of the system will mean officers will take little time in adapting to the new way of doing their administration work on their PDAs. The tender for the PDAs to the service has yet to be finalised but Doug outlines that around 60 will be ordered, one for each fire engine, fire safety officer and community partnership manager. This will allow everyone to access the database at anytime on the GPRS network, which will be consistently updated and always live.
Furthermore the system is designed to be adaptable to developments in technology. “The speed of technological change means that we had to ensure that the system wouldn’t be obsolete by using a system that is device agnostic. In addition we have a few of our personnel being trained on how to upgrade the system in-house so we can be responsible for keeping it up-to-date.”
If the system proves to be as successful as Buckinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service believes it will be, then other services around the country could look to adapt their own similar systems.“Hopefully other services looking to implement a similar procedure can use our experience as a useful example.”
Could the politicians call for fewer pen pushers become a thing of the past with the onset of systems like these? It may be early days yet, but emergency services personnel doing the vast majority of their necessary administration while still on shift is a step in the right direction.
