| Commissioner's Corner by Dave Fuller, Allen County Building Commissioner |
 It has now been a year since we started the implementation of our new computer system, and it appears we are getting close to completion. There have been a lot of growing pains as the Allen County/Fort Wayne implementation was so diverse across the various departments. Our vendor has acknowledged that this has been one of the largest and most complicated projects they have experienced. As you are aware, the building department previous used a custom built package that was written to meet our specific needs and no off the shelf program was going to be able to duplicate that. But Accela has worked hard to match the functionality our previous software.That leads me to the point of this article. We now have the public portion of the system up and running so that you as contractors/permit holders are now able to access the specifics of your projects on line as you were able to do with our old system. We are starting training sessions to show users how to access the system and what features are available. In short, a building contractor can access the results of inspections for his own permits as well as any sub contractor permits linked to his own (plumbing, heating, electrical, non-san). As before, you can request inspections on line rather than through the phone system, and can see the status of your inspection request (i.e. claimed, enroute). Additionally, if you are considering hiring a new sub contractor, you can verify that he is licensed in Allen County. While we have had these features available through our previous software for several years, the concept of providing this level of project management to contractors was a new concept to Accela. Therefore, much of this part of the system was an enhancement for Allen County. They liked the idea well enough that they are looking at incorporating it in the standard package in the future. As with any developing program, we will continue to tweak and adjust the features to try and make the system more user-friendly and useful. To do that we need and welcome your feedback as you begin using the system. If you are interested in learning how to access and use the on line system, please contact Kathy (449-7162) or Joanne (449-7224) to arrange to join one of the training sessions Roger will be leading. Thanks for your continued patience through this implementation process. |
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