Will I get a “heads up” on my request? How will I know when the maintenance technician will show up to do the work?

Planon has an "automated notifications” feature in place. The following status changes will trigger an automated e-mail to your uvm.edu address. These email will appear as coming from sos@uvm.edu.
-Confirmation email when you first enter your request in system.
-Notification email when maintenance technician has been assigned to your request.
-Notification email when technician has technically completed your request, and
-Notification email when your Request has been administratively completed.

What if my Request relates to something outdoors? What "property" do I enter as the location?

The “Property” box is mandatory and always needs a value to be filled in. The Floor and Space fields can be left blank.  Property is required because otherwise we wouldn’t know where the problem is! 
For Building Exteriors or Grounds-related Services, you may pick the closest building to where the problem is ….or you can use the blue search box to find other. The drop-down list of Properties includes places like Parking Lots and areas of campus that are not buildings.   The (“Select a Value”) Search allows you to search on Property Names. For example, you can type in ‘Allen house’ and click search to narrow the list. You can choose Allen House Grounds or Allen House Parking Lot, depending on what the issue is about. 

Who can enter a new Service Request for facilities-related services?

Planon is available to all University employees. All staff have the basic “Requestor” role and can submit service requests (ranging from building maintenance repairs to custodial cleaning requests) for issues in their office or building.

Will there be specific training sessions about using Planon?

Training for “Requestors” will largely be done through video tutorials and/or basic written documentation linked on this website.  Planon is intuitive for “front-end” users and we’re confident campus stakeholders will get the hang of it in no time.  “Back-end” users of Planon (i.e., all the staff within UVM Facilities Management Units) have received advance training and had time to practice using the software in the weeks leading up to the software launch.

Can I have “favorites” saved for my departmental Chartstrings so that I don’t have to manually type in my Chart String for each new request?

Entering your budget Chart of Accounts segements should be easier in Planon (compared to our old system). Most every data field in Planon uses “pick from list” data validations so you can avoid typing in long strings of numbers (and you no longer need “tildas”. Yay!)   On the back-end, we can create Chartstring favorites (known as Speedcharts) for budgets that you frequently use.  Just email us your details including department name and the entire Chartstring (Chart of Accounts) 'sequence' and the nickname of what you’d like to call it.

Will I be able to see the progress on the work order when checking back on my request?

Yes, the “My requests” widget on your Home screen displays a list of all the requests you’ve already submitted. This listing shows the status of your request. To view more details about the work order (resulting from your request), click on the “Work Overview” task specific interface (TSI) to see the list of all your Request Orders along with additional details.

What if my department assignment is not listed correctly in Planon?

The personnel data listed in Planon is imported from the University’s LDAP (Directory). Planon pulls in basic information from LDAP such as your name, NetID, preferred pronoun, and your department. If any of these data fields are not correct, then you’ll need to correct the information in the UVM Directory.

What if my office location is not listed correctly in Planon? 

Your official space assignment (i.e. the office number and building that’s shown in your Planon user profile) is derived from UVM’s official Space Inventory data which also will be kept inside Planon.  Users cannot change or edit their own space assignment. If it is not listed correctly, notify your department’s designated Space Survey Administrator and they will work with the Campus Planning team to correct the information during the next campus-wide survey (likely in early 2024).

What happens if employees do not 'pause' or 'complete' work (on the Work Order ticket)?

Employees (i.e. front line technicians) can only work on one Work Order at any given time. In the Planon AppSuite mobile app, if they don't "pause" their first Work Order then Planon will not allow them to start work on a second Work Order. Employees can start ("wrench in") and stop ("pause") Work Orders throughout their day; they just cannot be putting effort towards more than one Work Order at a time.

Will employees (i.e. technicians) get reminders or notifications that Orders are still open or are past due?

Technicians using the PlanonAppsuite Mobile App will get an e-mail notification. In the Planon AppSuite mobile app, each technician can easily sees their "My Jobs" listing which highlights the ones that are due first. They will continue to see all the Orders assigned to them on their "My Jobs" listing until they actually mark each Order as finished or completed and then it will fall off of their My Jobs list.

Is there a 'cheat sheet' of what all of the little icons mean?

Indeed the software developers sure do love their symbols! Here are some we found listed in Planon Webhelp online. The Action Buttons that mobile users see and the color legend that Resource Planner users see.  

Can comments on jobs be edited at any time, by anyone, and can they be moved from comments to communication by anyone, at any time?

Comments cannot be edited once submitted from a technician's mobile device. Back-office users can edit comments found in "Comments" and "Internal communications". System generated "com logs" cannot be edited by anyone.

If front-line technician swipes in early (to Kronos) to deal with an emergency, how does Planon interact with Kronos?

The swipes from Kronos have no bearing on the effort reporting (timecard) in Planon. Technicians should continue to swipe in and out in Kronos as they always have. 

Can we create custom groups/teams for our Resource Planner, and how do we do that?

Yes, groups that appear on your Resource Planner can be customized. Please email iwms.help@uvm.edu with the details you'd like to have, and we'll configure that for you. 

How do we assign work to multiple people/trades for larger projects, such as a motor replacement that needs HVAC, Electrician, Controls, and FRP?

Using Resource Planner, Supervisors can assign a work order to a person or to a grouping of people (e.g. all the electricians within your crew). Supervisors can also assign additional people to the same order by hovering on the order already assigned, then holding "Ctrl" (which creates a duplicate of the order) that can then be dragged and dropped onto another person's planner board. The order number will be the same for all assignees.   If you want to assign work to an entirely different crew or team, then best practice is to add a "Sub Order" to the original Order. (This is similar to what we called "parent" and "child" work orders in our old system).