Olsson - making sure we are as safe as houses
Olsson Fire & Risk do Passive Fire Inspections for houses, hotels and apartments as well as commercial properties. Having worked with them for over a year, it has been an interesting journey and one that has left me with a better appreciation of the work they do, and reinforces how pleased I am that, with Clarinspect on their side, they can spend more time on site ensuring buildings are more effectively protected with passive fire systems.
A Fire Engineer inspecting a fire penetration
Olsson Fire & Risk is an international Consulting Engineers company specialising in Fire Safety and Fire Protection for private, commercial, and public sector works. Founded by Per Olsson and Carl Voss, the company has been growing throughout Australia and New Zealand since 2011, with expansion into the UK.
Their in-house expertise across all aspects of fire engineering – from risk assessment to design, engineering, approval and implementation – enables them to provide safer, smarter, and more cost-effective fire safety and protection solutions.
The Christchurch branch has been Olsson's head office in New Zealand for 2 years, with a branch in Wellington and a newly established branch in Auckland.
What Olsson Needed
A sealed structural fire penetration
A typical Passive Fire Inspection schedule includes a Pre-line Inspection (inspecting the bare bones of a building, at the frame-only stage), a Post-line Inspection (inspecting the cladding, screw depth, joints etc.), Construction Monitoring/Final Inspection (PS4), and Snagging (alongside the Final Inspection).
Before switching to Clarinspect, the process for doing an inspection and writing the report was clunky and time-consuming, with a frustrating amount of triple-handling of photographs. A Fire Inspection could take an hour or more on-site followed by half-a-day minimum back at the office to write the report. All photographs taken needed to be first uploaded then downloaded, formatted, named, and merged with the report before sending on to the client.
The Clarinspect Approach
Clarinspect worked closely with the Olsson staff to review the inspection forms and turn them into an inspection on a mobile device – turning around the first prototype in under two hours. We reviewed this prototype and then created the next version again in a matter of hours, along with the output report.
“Working with Clarinspect is great – whenever needed, they’re there on the end of a phone happy to help. The communication with Clarinspect is really good”
The Clarinspect approach is to use the client’s existing report templates, and our reporting software adds the inspection data into all the right places with supporting photos. There's no need to go into lots of different programmes to write one report – as Olsson did before – with Clarinspect, once an Inspection is synced the report is produced for you, and formatted to your standard. This approach ensures consistency and brand continuity, along with a clear audit-trail. Because Clarinspect reuses your data where possible, the Inspection system delivers what is needed – as well as what is wanted.
Olsson Fire & Risk's Use of Clarinspect
Olsson’s first Clarinspect system was a Pre-Line Inspection. They trialled this using devices borrowed from Clarinspect, but the trial went so well they bought their own devices soon after. Clarinspect quickly became the tool of choice for engineers within the department and, before long, the potential of the system became too obvious to ignore.
“Before, I’d spend maybe an hour on-site and 4 hours writing the report. Now I may take 2 hours on-site because I’m recording greater detail, and then spend only an hour and half on the report”
Using Clarinspect for the whole suite of Inspections gives Olsson a complete record for a site in one consistent format. The mobile system acts as a prompt, so all Inspections are completed fully and correctly, and helps to confine vocabulary when needed – but with the option of adding notes for exceptions or where more detail is required.
The time-consuming, triple-handling of photographs has been eliminated. Because Clarinspect locks all photographs taken to the corresponding section of the form, observations are added immediately into the correct section of the report. The report can then be triggered from anywhere with an internet connection.
Alan: "I was recently sat in Auckland Airport waiting for my flight. I synced the device from there, and the report was almost immediately sent to my email – I opened it on my laptop to check the report then fired it away to the client, no need to come into the office at all!"
A bonus benefit was around improved safety on-site: the days of being 30 foot up a ladder and clinging on while wrangling a separate clipboard, inspection form, camera, and pen were over. With Clarinspect, the items needed to be carried reduce to one – a single mobile device of either tablet or phone.
Business Outcomes
Click to download Olsson Fire & Risk case study
Since starting with Clarinspect, the Passive Fire department has been able to do more inspections and are now writing many more reports - because business is growing. The contractors whose work they inspect have noticed a difference: they no longer have to query so many points, even though the inspectors now report more issues in more detail.
"The faster turnaround is a business advantage for us," said Alan.
The use of Clarinspect has helped Olsson to grow turnover for the Passive Fire Inspections at a time when it was ripe for growing. Thanks to their quicker and better inspections, they've taken on four additional engineers at the Christchurch office and are now looking at expanding the department to their offices in Wellington and Auckland – and they will be taking Clarinspect software with them!
Says Alan Page: "Our work so far with Clarinspect is just the beginning – the start of a continuous relationship that will adapt to suit us as our needs change and grow."
For more on Olsson Fire & Risk See www.olssonfire.com