Safety Through Technology: Now Is The Time

It’s no wonder that propane companies throughout Canada and the United States invest so much time training employees on gas safety checks, leak checks, safety concerning the delivery and dispensing of propane and propane installation safety, among many others – technical and nontechnical – involving this industry.

Now is the time for technology to meet the safety needs of companies, clients and workers alike. For example: Automation and documentation not only protect companies from accidents and lawsuits, this same technology makes it easier for technicians and drivers to do their respective jobs with greater speed and convenience. For that technology ensures consistency of quality, and offers the necessary reliability regarding propane installation, service calls and quick record keeping on behalf of customers large and small.

That also means we have a duty to innovate, so we can free these people from the sea of paper – the tickets and receipts, the work orders and memoranda, the invoices and order slips – that threatens to prevent them from doing the very things they need to achieve and their clients expect to receive. Without technology that solves this problem, and absent the time to manually spot check every assignment and confirm the safety of every project, there is no way to ensure standards do not weaken or procedures do not worsen.

The risks are too great – and the liabilities are too substantial – for companies to leave customers so vulnerable to danger. Now is the time, therefore, to maximize the power of technology through the principal sources of technology: The mobile devices we use every day, in which a single application – call it the Ultimate Safety App – eliminates the drudgery of paperwork, identifies potential safety and maintenance challenges, enables a technician or driver to do a gas check or find a leak, and notifies a professional when a test is wrong or a client’s safety system fails.

This app should also alert management about specific safety matters, filing – and storing – all relevant paperwork as a digital record. That means there is no chance documents will go missing, or legal materials will suddenly vanish.

Picture, too, an interactive dashboard that highlights areas of trouble or instances of failure – and creates a schedule about those things requiring repair now, tomorrow, next week or next month. This digital safety manager would track everything, from doing and confirming spot checks during the course of other work a driver or technician may oversee to checking individual propane tanks, so everyone – such as owners of propane delivery companies, drivers, managers, operators and clients – can enjoy an unprecedented degree of safety.

There would even be records of each location, complemented by images of signed documents and ancillary materials.

This technology exists – we use this technology across Canada and the States – because it is the result of research by and from experts within the propane industry. Put another way, I feel – my colleagues feel – the collective pain of an environment that is too prone to error, too subject to threats, too open to danger, too risky overall.

Now is the time to put safety first.

Now is the time to advance the strength of the propane industry.

Now is the time to do an audit of this business, for the good of all, because the technology is available – the technology is affordable – for owners, drivers and technicians, in addition to clients both residential and commercial, who deserve the best.

The translation of that summons to safety is an opportunity for communication to thrive and collaboration to flourish, thanks to the power of technology that is easy to use, reliable to access and protective of the files people need.
This emphasis on safety through technology is at the forefront of how the propane industry can make mobile devices an indispensable part of safety. Indeed, the future of one depends on the proliferation of the other. That is, the more often we use these devices – and we use them a lot already – the more seamless the

transition will be, within our business, toward improved safety and efficiency.
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​We must seize this moment, since the dividends are too many to ignore and the immediate rewards are too substantial to deny.
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The future is now.