The Background
With the supermarket retail industry worth over £190bn and an estimated estate of over 12,704 stores, keeping them in good working condition and managing layout changes is a stressful business. Timescales are tight and jobs are often carried out at night by teams of contractors across the UK. This makes managing it complex and requires a high degree of trust in the teams and suppliers involved to deliver work on time. In amongst the project management challenges, health and safety regulations need to be met continuously.
Often with the work, teams will be working at height and need to use MEWPs (mobile elevating work platforms) to do so. Without the MEWPs, work can’t go ahead and that can mean plans ruined with teams stood unable to complete their projects. This results in lost time and money for the contractors.
The Problem
This was the case for a Horizon Platforms customer who works with several of the largest supermarkets and retail brands in the UK on a national basis. They are responsible for fitting out and relocating stores and properties. This means that working at height, safely and efficiently, is a major requirement for them to complete their projects. They regularly hire high volumes of access platforms, across multiple sites throughout the UK on a short-term basis. This work is completed around the clock which involves significant project management and logistics challenges. Whether jobs are scheduled or reactive, each job needs to be completed to high standards safely with no delays.
When they approached Horizon Platforms, they were regularly experiencing downtime and extra costs owing to poor powered access supply from their previous supplier.
Issues They Encountered Regularly
- Delayed deliveries
- Platforms arriving broken or with flat batteries or low charge
- Breakdowns occurring within hours of receiving machines
- Broken or missing accessories such as user manuals or charging cables
- Machines arriving without LOLERs
- Unable to get platform replacements or resolution to breakdowns within acceptable timeframes or terms
These issues are avoidable almost 100% of time with the right approach to powered access hire. Dealing with these problems was costing them time and money. Furthermore, it led to difficult conversations with their customers about project delays. They were relying on contingency planning more than necessary. Reduced project margin was becoming the norm.
Cheap Hire Rates Became A Contradiction!
Based on our client’s feedback, they were experiencing problems with about 9% of their platform hires, as a minimum, each month. When switching to Horizon Platforms the issues reduced to 1.81% per month.
After experiencing 5-7 issues per week, sometimes 10, our client’s Operations Director estimated “poor platform hire was costing in the region of £7,000 – £14,000 per week”. Downtime and delays as a result meant they were losing money and having to re-book work. Also, some clients were imposing penalties for projects overrunning.
On the surface, they were getting what appeared to be a very competitive hire rate. However, this was quickly eroded by increasing unplanned costs and penalties. Conversations with customers about project delays were becoming far too regular.
They reached out to Horizon Platforms to discuss an alternative supplier who could support their needs.
How Did Switching to Horizon Improve Their Situation?
After initial conversations with the contractor, a trial was set up to test Horizon Platforms service levels. A comparison of rates actually showed Horizon rates to be higher than their current supplier, so they needed assurance that service levels would offer added value for the price increase.
Once the client started working with Horizon full-time, following the short trial, our client was able to improve their efficiencies and costs. Horizon has saved them £000s through a consistent, fast and flexible service. So, whilst the rates may have been higher, Horizon were the ‘cheaper’ supplier due to the savings made from vastly improved service levels. Teams stood waiting for equipment or abandoning their jobs due to MEWP breakdown’s was a very rare occurrence.
- On average they have had less than 1 issue per month with Horizon, opposed to 28 previously. Which is approximately a 96% reduction!
- They’re no longer losing £7,000 – £14,000 per week owing to platform supply problems.
- Approximately 98% of their hires with Horizon Platforms are trouble-free.
- They now have fewer difficult conversations with customers about platform-supply related downtime or delays.
| Previous Supplier | Horizon Platforms | |
| Avg. Machines on Hire Per Month | 220 | 220 |
| Avg. Hire Issues Per Month | 28 | 1 |
| % Hires Affected Per Month | 12.72% | 1.81% |
Do These Problems Sound Familiar in Your Business?
There are always administrative, time, and financial impacts following late deliveries and machine failure which can negatively affect your bottom line or your ability to win repeat business. Our plea is, don’t put up with it! At Horizon Platforms we have crafted our proposition around being able to support our customers with a great service to allow them to work effectively and safely at height no matter what time of day.
From our super-depot in West Yorkshire and via our Altogether Better partner network, we can access a fleet of 16,000 machines, reaching every corner of the UK. It allows us to guarantee high service standards and platform-quality. In fact, 98% of our UK-wide platform hires are trouble-free. And no, this isn’t just ‘cross-hire’. Each of our partners are regularly benchmarked to ensure they match our exacting standards. We’re Altogether Better!
So if you are ready to experience our unrivalled service contact our team or complete the form below.