News
Issue No. 62 - December/January 2011
MyTime app wins ZEN eChallenge
A smartphone app and web interface to efficiently link tradespeople with builders and contractors has won this year’s University of Adelaide ZEN eChallenge competition.
MyTime, with members PhD student Luke Holtham, David Holtham, Leon Whitehead, Dean Calvert, Adam Basheer and Daniel Wilson, won the $10,000 first prize at an Awards dinner at the National Wine Centre in early November.
The MyTime application helps tradespeople source work and builders find tradespeople, and provides easy recording of hours, billing of services, verification of work tickets and future work.
“The original idea stemmed from some real issues in the construction industry,” says team spokesman, Adam Basheer. “The first issue is paperwork. Paperwork is a real hassle for anyone let alone people on a worksite as apposed to sitting at a desk.
“It seems incredible but a lot of the timesheet recording is still done by hand – a frustration for workers and management and a costly one at that. Producing a simple timesheet system that links into a smart phone seemed an obvious way to achieve this, particularly because you can remind people every day to fill in their time sheet and make it easy for them to do so. This can be easily sent to the sub contractor who sends it onto the prime contractor.
“A second major issue for workers and management is the need for tickets to prove you have the training for the job. Many workers have a wallet the size of a brick filled with all the tickets they need to operate on a worksite. As we know, “no ticket, no start”. If lost, tickets cost at least $90 to replace, which can take up to two weeks. They lose two weeks pay (and if) the project starts to get behind the delay costs everyone. So an electronic means to certify tickets is a great result for all the industry.
“The third issue is the way workers find work. They basically scan gazettes and talk to their mates in the industry. Whereas white coll...
