The City of Garland Utilities Customer Service Department serves approximately 85,000 accounts for electric, water, wastewater, and solid waste utilities. The City’s electric and water utilities consist of approximately 74,000 electric meters and 70,000 water meters.
Garland underwent three major CIS implementations and upgrades in 13 years, including one unsuccessful implementation. The City needed to prioritize its needs and desires for its long-term stability, efficiency, and growth. As a result, the City hired Raftelis, formerly Westin, to help them select a user-friendly commercial-off-the-shelf customer information system that would move into the future with Garland and improve the City’s customer service and billing capabilities. The solution included a customer self-service portal to deliver modern payment and account management functionality, and a mobile workforce management system to provide the City with the ability to plan, control, and account for the City’s field resources.
Raftelis’ system selection efforts began with leading the City through a Project Vision Workshop to define the organization’s vision and objectives and clarify project scope and approach. Business Process Review workshops and creating a Procurement Strategy Report followed this. Raftelis executed the procurement strategy by assisting the City with gathering requirements, developing the RFP, evaluating vendors, and negotiating the vendor contracts. The City awarded the contract to Advanced Utility Systems (AUS). The final contract included MyMeter customer portal and Service Link for mobile workforce management.
The City chose to manage the implementation using City resources. The implementation project was severely delayed from the original 18 months to over three years. Some causes were key vendor resource changes and deliverable delays, COVID, and operational challenges for the City due to Winter Storm Uri. The delay deteriorated the relationship and communication between the City and vendor(s). In a last-ditch effort to salvage the project, Raftelis was re-hired to refocus it and get it back on track. Raftelis brought structure and discipline to the project, holding the vendor accountable for deliverables and the City responsible for testing. As a result, Garland could successfully go live with all three systems without disrupting business.
