ParaDoor 2007 Software: A Breathe of Fresh Air for Mountain Air Garage Door

 

Snapshot
A garage door dealer and installer works with
Paradigm Software at its own pace to set up a business management and accounting system to streamline installation, service and sales.

Eldon and Eldwin Eby of Mountain Air Garage Door have a lot of experience under their belts being in the construction and building business for the past 20 years. However, along with their expertise comes a lot of work – and paperwork – to keep track of.

With nearly 4,000 work orders to process a year, the father-and-son team needs to keep their business running as smoothly as the garage doors they install and service.

The Situation

A few years ago, Eldon Eby, who owns the Shirleysburg, Pennsylvania-based garage door dealer and installer, realized he had enough paperwork to fill an entire garage -- and then some. He also was counting the days until his basic accounting software package ran out of room and he’d need to start deleting critical historical business information.

The paperwork was not only a burden on his staff but it also was affecting customer service. “Paperwork was late,” explained Eldon. “It was misplaced, and we could never find it when we needed it.”

While he knew he needed to replace his accounting software, Eldon believed the success of his business hinged on business management software. “We needed to keep everything straight,” said Eldon. “The scheduler was the main thing – keeping our guys straight.” Mountain Air has seven employees and schedules between 10 and 15 jobs a day.

In addition to being able to accurately and easily manage staff and schedule jobs, he wanted to be able to streamline the quoting process. He was interested in having a system that would provide customers with a quote that would include all the information they needed about the product, the job, and the payment terms so they could sign the quote and initiate the job.

Along with the business management software, Eldon wanted to upgrade to more robust accounting software that would grow with his business. At the time, he was not interested in customizing the accounting software, but he did want to make sure it was compatible with the business management software so he could eventually automate the accounting functions.

 

The Solution

 

Mountain Air Garage Door explored a few options before settling on Paradigm business management and accounting software for field service companies.

Initially Eldon looked into specific accounting packages garage door manufacturers offer. These packages were set up to automate a lot of the functions Mountain Air was looking for but, in the end, they were not fitting the company’s needs. For example, these packages included their own door model numbers, which were not the same door model numbers Mountain Air used.

Eldon also considered working with programmers to build a program from scratch, but it was going to be considerably more expensive and not as expansive.

Mountain Air Garage Door chose Paradigm because the software manufacturer was able to customize not only the content – down to the company’s own door model numbers – but also the components it wanted customized and when.

Mountain Air developed its business management and accounting software in stages, starting with its most business-critical components. Paradigm worked with Mountain Air first to customize its scheduling, then its order processing and next its invoicing. Lastly, it incorporated the accounting function.

In fact, Mountain Air used its customized scheduler and order processing software alongside its original accounting system until it felt prepared to automate its accounting functions into Paradigm.

“We built a customized service for us that would work for our scheduling, and then, when we were ready, we brought in accounting,” Eldon noted.
“Our main concern was that we could actually link the accounting system together with everything else that we wanted customized. What’s great is that we can put in one entry and keep clicking down the line. We initiate a quote, then it turns into an invoice, and then we can put it right over into the schedule. Now, with the system integrated into accounting, once the information is entered into a quote, it can tumble all the way down the line clear into history.”

Eby estimates that he worked with Paradigm on his own timetable over the course of a year and a half to customize the components he wanted, each component taking a “decent” few weeks to complete.

Eby is now already working with Paradigm to further customize the software, since he is expanding his business to include servicing garage doors. The new software components will allow him to schedule calls as well as create work orders, invoices and bills for services such as balancing doors, fixing hinges and repairing photo eye safety systems.

 

The Opportunity

 

The two main benefits Mountain Air Garage Doors sees to choosing Paradigm is its ability to customize and its strong commitment to customer service. “They can take a whole business, whatever you want to do, and customize the software for you. The main thing that drew us, that convinced us, to go with Paradigm was that they were the only ones that could do the scheduling the way we wanted. We needed scheduling laid out before us every day of the year and they could do it with the number of employees we had.”

Now, thanks to Paradigm, Eldon and Eldwin Eby and their colleagues can spend their time opening doors to new business, not burying their heads in paperwork in the back office. “Paradigm has saved us a pile of headaches and aggravation,” Eldon Eby concludes. “There is much less paper and we can now find things. It’s really worked super for us.”