When one of Unipart Dorman’s customers realised they needed a critical piece of equipment, the team rose to the challenge and pulled out all the stops in order to deliver trackside within 24 hours.
A major customer of Unipart Dorman, one of the UK’s leading LED signalling and information systems providers, were due to commission a Crossrail Project over the Easter period. The day before the project was due to start, they discovered that a cable, ordered from another supplier, had been wrongly supplied and the plug coupled connection was not able to interface with the plug coupler at the end of the Unipart Dorman signal.
If this critical piece of equipment couldn’t be delivered over the weekend, it could cause major time overruns and massive expense in re-arranging the job or in delay penalties. The customer needed to have the cable within 24 hours.
The team developed the specification, sourced the parts, made the cable, tested it and got it track-side within 24 hours. A significant achievement and one that exceeded the expectations of the client.
A specification was defined, parts were sourced within the company, the cable created and assembled and tested the cable and plug couplers. The team all stayed late on the Wednesday evening to get it all done, but by Thursday morning the cable was ready.
The customer came to Unipart Dorman with a challenge, and this team rose to that challenge. The responsiveness that this team has shown to meeting an exceptional customer requirement was outstanding. The team saw the urgency of the customer request, and pulled out “all the stops” to produce a solution that exactly met that need.
The customer in this instance was doubtful whether a solution could be delivered in time, and did not trust the original cable manufacturer to solve this issue. This team saw this as an opportunity to demonstrate their skills and capabilities, and understood the impact of not having this essential piece of kit for the Easter weekend closedown of the track. This is a great example of a small team showing initiative to deliver an agile solution based on a real understanding of the customer’s needs.