Automated NTEs enable work order management at scale
To process work orders at scale, facilities management (FM) teams rely on not-to-exceed (NTE) limits for establishing the maximum amount spent on a work order. Any quote above the NTE requires approval by the facilities manager.
NTEs were designed to save time and money and streamline workflows. Historically, the traditional approach to setting NTEs has relied more on gut instincts and educated guesses than market research.
The lack of market data and region-specific costs made the process of setting NTEs confusing, arbitrary, and, worst of all, inefficient. FM teams either set NTEs too high and spent too much money or set them too low and had few, if any, vendors willing to pick up work orders.
Finding the perfect balance with Corrigo SmartNTE
SmartNTE, a module within JLLT’s industry leading Corrigo software, uses machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) to dynamically set NTEs, benchmarked against industry data. NTE settings are flexible and can be configured for user preferences either to keep maintenance costs low or to get work orders completed quickly.
Every time a work order is created, the AI capabilities inside Corrigo analyze millions of data points to dynamically set NTE limits optimized for region, season, work type and work history.
Corrigo processes 15 million transactions per year. SmartNTE leverages this rich data to set market-driven NTEs that maximize efficiency, maintain budgets, and keep service providers in check.
The economic impact of SmartNTE
JLL commissioned a third-party analyst to study the “The Total Economic Impact of SmartNTE,” which revealed the following:
- SmartNTE saves an average of $1.1 million in work order spend over three years
- SmartNTE reduces invoice payments by 5.23%, a savings of $34 per work order. A medium-sized FM team processing 10,000 work orders per year would save $340,000 annually.
- SmartNTE enables customers to confidently raise their cost limits, lowers their fears of being overcharged, and keeps the FM team under budget
- Optimizing SmartNTE improves the likelihood of first-time fix, thereby resulting in additional savings, fewer trip charges, and less downtime.
The synergy of SmartNTEs and business intelligence
Like SmartNTE, the new Corrigo business intelligence (BI) module generates time and cost savings and streamlined workflows. Both take advantage of automation to drive greater efficiency and productivity. Both are informed by benchmarks, and both are dynamic, updating in real time to reflect market data.
The BI module goes a step further by delivering prescriptive recommendations, like identifying equipment needing replacement and opportunities for more cost-effective vendor management.
BI metrics and insights are neatly summarized in visual dashboards—the intensive data crunching happens automatically behind the scenes. The dashboards enable facilities managers, executive leadership, and other stakeholders to quickly grasp the metrics that matter for faster and more-informed decision making.
Recent blog posts about the Service Provider Insights dashboard and Asset Insights dashboard highlighted the unprecedented visibility into FM operations possible with BI. Likewise, the actionable recommendations for boosting operational performance can quickly improve FM ROI.
The same holds true for SmartNTE, which is included in the Corrigo Business Intelligence module. The impact of SmartNTE is felt immediately as automated benchmarking frees up the FM team for higher priority work while capturing time- and cost-savings on work orders.
Next steps
SmartNTE automates and streamlines work order management and aligns with the efficiencies of business intelligence. View our SmartNTE video to learn more.
To discover how your FM operations can benefit from BI insights and actionable, prescriptive recommendations, visit our Business Intelligence solutions page or contact a Corrigo expert today.
