Property Vista (PV) now provides for the management and reporting of waste management related activities, through building inspections. Property management companies (PMCs) are charged by waste haulers on a per bin bases. A property can have different types of bins, depending on the types of waste. A hauler van visit a property multiple times per week, each time picking up bins with a specific waste type. A PMC can also hire different haulers to pick up different waste types.
PV users are now able to create inspections to track the pick up of bins by the haulers. The new Waste Management policy takes it one step further and allows users to automate the creation of the inspections based on a schedule.
Each inspection can represent each time a hauler arrives at the property to pick up the bins. The haulers arrive at the property and usually pick up bins of a single waste type, i.e. blue bins on Thursdays.
Manually Adding a new Waste Management Building Inspection
To create a new inspection, go to the Maintenance tab > Building Inspections > on the top right corner click on New Building Inspection. On the page that follows:
After clicking Save, system creates a new inspection. By default the Inspections Bins tab is populated with the bins based on the Waste Management policy, mentioned later below in this article. Each bin is distinguished based on the area name, i.e Black Bin or Green Bin, Bin Name, and Bin Size, i.e. 3 yard, 50 Gal. Click on this tab, and click on a bin to fill out the details.
After clicking Save, feel free to move on and fill out other bins, based on the number of bins which the hauler is picking up in a single occasion.
Waste Management Policy
Waste management inspections, like all other inspections, are configured based on a policy. The policy can be found in the admin menu > Policies > Maintenance and Inspection > Inspection Policies. There is a default Organization scope policy which can be modified, but users can also create additional policies as best suited.
A new policy can be created anytime, however not at the Organization scope. There can only be one policy at this scope. An Organization scope policy covers all properties in the system. This is the highest scope of policy in the system. Other lower scope polices can be created. Each lower-scope policy, overrides a higher scope policy. The Organization scope is overridden by a Province scope policy. A Province scope policy covers all properties within a selected province. This policy can be overridden by a Complex scope policy, which includes all properties within a Complex. A complex comprises of one or many properties in the system. This policy can ultimately be overridden by a Building scope policy, the lowest scope. The definition of the different scopes was provided here as guidance, however it is not required that users create such policies. Through this information, users are now aware of the policy logic, and better able to predict system behaviour. So if you have a Building scope policy for building 33 Yonge St., and you manually create a waste management inspection, the created inspection will be created based on the Building scope policy, vs the Organization scope one.
Adding a New Policy
You do not need to create a new policy to create a waste management inspection. You can manually create an inspection currently based on the default Organization policy, as explained above. In this section we will explore how to create a new inspection policy, in case there is a need to create a policy with different parameters than the Organization policy. For example you might need to create a different policy if one or many buildings have different pick up schedules, and you need to automate the creation of inspections
Navigate to the same Inspections Policies grid as mentioned above. On the top right corner, click on the New Inspection Policy button.
After clicking Save, system will create the policy, but there is still some more work to be done. Click on the Inspection Objects tab. On the top right corner, click on New Inspection Policy Item. On the Inspection Template Object window, click in the Area field.
Click OK to confirm the bin. On the same Inspection Template Object window, click on the Inspection Objects field and select Fullness. Click Save when done. Repeat as many times as you need to, until all desired bins have been added
The final step is to configure the Scheduling. By creating a schedule, you can automate the creation of inspections, so to avoid creating them manually. Since a building will have multiple types of waste, and therefore multiple waste pick ups, multiple schedules can be created on the same policy. For example, different schedules can be created for different Service Providers (haulers). Or a different schedule can also be created for the same hauler but different waste pick up on different days. To create a schedule, click on the Scheduling tab, then click on the pencil icon on the right of the policy name to edit or create a schedule.
Definition of the Repeat Type field:
- If you select Daily, and enter the number 1 under the Repeat Every field, system will create an inspection every day. If you enter the number 2, every other day, and so on with each number.
- The logic is similar if you select Weekly and enter values in the Repeat Every field
- However if you select Weekly and select weekdays on the Select Specific Days field, you can automate the schedule to create inspections on specific days of the week, i.e. every Monday and Wednesday
- The logic is the same as point one with selecting Repeat Type as Monthly or Yearly and the Repeat Every field
Create a Service Provider
Creating a provider is as easy as going to the Admin menu > Settings tab > Maintenance & Inspection > Inspection Service Providers and clicking on the New Inspection Service Provider button on the top right corner. On the page that follows enter the name of the provider and select the Service Type. A provider can be created as related to waste management, but also for Snow Removal or other general services.