Hello Community,
This is my first post here. I'm trying to establish if Power Pages will be suitable for what I would like to achieve. I'm aware that I could read all about this by rummaging through the internet. However, I feel I will get some more accurate help here, from those amongst you, who perhaps have a robust insight of the software’s capabilities, and who can find the time to offer their thoughts, advice or simply point me in the right direction. I'd like to start with a thank you if I may please. In advance of any replies.
A Bit of Background About Me
I'm a particularly old person. I'm just over 60 years of age. I did learn basic programming at school, some 46 years ago. That was in the days when my programs were stored on "ticker tape". I programmed the computer to play Mastermind which is a game of two players where one player hides four coloured pegs, and their opponent has to work out the colours and sequence. I managed a frail 38 out of 40 or 95% :-). In the late 80's I taught myself to use Lotus 1-2-3 and was the first person to introduce spreadsheets into the company I worked for.
I earn my living in construction. I am a Quantity Surveyor (QS). The construction industry in the UK has not embraced technology very well. The spreadsheets that I used in the late 80's to support my role have changed little, if any, since then. They have more columns and an overwhelming amount of additional information on them, but they remain very much the same.
Excel spreadsheets are on every desktop in the industry.
What I Want to Achieve
The industry generates numbers at a very early stage of a site. These numbers are often used in separate systems as the works progress. The overhead this creates is huge. Some large software companies offer solutions. However, these are "bolt-ons" added to the companies accounting system and are simply not fit for purpose.
I aim to create a virtual administration clerk to support QS's. The system would need to allow users in an office or on site to connect to the app. For example a site-based employee, let's say a painter, finishes work in a new home. As he closes the door behind him he connects to the app and completes the plot number and the stage of build. These two numbers then pass through the website and eventually end up on a spreadsheet. The spreadsheet will raise the monthly application for payment at month end.
The "admin clerk" (AC) will then chase down the necessary signatures from the customer. The AC will be programmable by the user to chase at intervals of choice. The AC will also text or email the user if signatures aren't secured.
I've outlined this in very simple terms. The target customers are subcontract companies with more than 10 site employees. I've some [limited knowledge] of spreadsheets and feel that the correct use of their database capabilities will manage the numbers well. The selling point in all of this is that Excel is on everyone's desktop.
I don't need a full-blown front end. It's more of a portal to direct traffic. But it would be a useful advertising platform.
Hopefully I've explained this well enough. The ultimate goal would be to handle a lot more data (a bit like Amazon tracks parcels) and seamlessly move numbers through the process without human intervention.
Thank you again
AsleepInYorks(shire)
