Merry Christmas from Tabs FM

Festive Tip of the Month

Go branch hunting outside. Spray-paint the branches in a silver or gold, pop them in a vase and voilà ... elegant Christmas decor.

Take it a step further and dangle some ornaments on them or tie a few bows.

Clients 2011

We would like to extend our thanks to those who have joined us this year, and, of course to our existing clients for their continued use of Tabs Systems. Your support is greatly appreciated. Thank you.

Clients for 2011 include:

Le Pain Quotidien
Natural Environment Research Council
Lancaster City Council
Bethnal Green Technology College
Aquinas College
Hempstead Valley Shopping Centre
Blackpool Airport
Healy Refrigeration
CB Richard Ellis
Pearson Managed Services
Macwhirter
Afton Chemical
Greenacre School for Girls
AJ Networks
Maidstone Borough Council
The Moredun Group
MKC Training Services
ErgoPlus Facilities Ltd
St Giles Hospice
Great Ormond Street Hospital
Hammerson PLC
London Borough of Waltham Forest
Jones FM

New Tabs Team

Over the past few months we've introduced two new members to the Tabs Team, building upon the strengths of the Training and Administration departments. We warmly welcome Ilona May and Sophie Bristow to the team.

Ilona has joined us a Training Consultant and offers a wealth of industry knowledge and training experience. Ilona is already proving to be a valuable and vibrant asset to the Training department.

Sophie joins our administration team as a Business Support Assistant. With a finance background and years of experience working with Tabs Systems, Sophie is ideally placed to help with any support/accounts queries and a welcome voice on the end of the phone.

We wish Ilona and Sophie all the best with their futures at Tabs FM.

CAFM System Health Checks

With the New Year approaching, this is usually the time when we begin to think about our new year's resolution. A few top resolutions include Get Healthy, Get Organised and Help Others. What's your resolution for 2012?

Now spare a thought for your Tabs System…systems can have resolutions too!

Kick start the New Year with a System Health Check and help your system get healthy, get organised and help others.

Health Checks?	Outcomes
System Performance	Examination of your system settings and configuration to discover if the system is accurately geared to your business process. There are many functions within Tabs Systems which can be switched on or off to suit your workflow. The Tabs FM Consultant will identify any inefficiencies for attention/action.
Data Quality	Data quality checks to identify duplicate and inconsistent data and suggest best use of the "static" data feeding your system. Provides recommendations on data best practices to improve the speed of searches and your filtered reports.
Best practice	Examines your users' system habits and makes recommendations for best practice when entering data, performing searches and generating reports.
Functionality in use	Are you using all the features of the modules you have purchased? We will help to identify functionality that can speed up your business processes and save you time, maximising the value of you system.
Training needs	Identifies training issues and recommends cost effective training solutions to fit your company budget, resources and learning style.

The Surgery is now taking bookings for 2012.

Contact sales@tabsfm.com or 0844 556 0488 to make your appointment

December 2011

Firstly, may we extend Season's Greetings to all and hope that Santa delivers to those who have been good throughout 2011. We have enjoyed a particularly eventful and encouraging year at Tabs Towers, navigating company growth and attendant growing pains. With a revised, strengthened Team in place, fast embracing new roles and responsibilities, we feel we are in good shape moving into 2012.

We will be introducing and delivering new product, initiating exciting new training platforms and focussing on development wish lists to enhance, extend and future proof Tabs Systems on your behalf.

The economic climate has obviously affected most of us and many clients suggest a pent up demand to invest in their systems when budgets allow. This affects both Internal FM and FM Service Provider models of Tabs users; the former trying to make internal cases for funds, the latter leveraged by demanding clients.

It is always our intention to help raise the profiles of our users. This may be the Facilities Department using the internal model and Business Development Teams promoting their services to multiple clients. We believe the support and services you offer are gaining more recognition in the market place and we aim to ensure that Tabs Systems will substantiate your rightful quest for recognition and reward as part of the core company goals.

So, here's to a well-earned few days away from the office and an Olympian performance in 2012.

The Tabs Team...

The Future of Mobile Operating Systems for Rugged Devices

Historically, Tabs FM have always developed mobile software for Windows Mobile devices. The driving force behind this approach is that Microsoft is often the selected Operating System of rugged and barcode scanning devices. But will this always be the case? Forever in discussions with providers of rugged handhelds, it appears that the chink in Windows Mobile armour is gradually getting bigger…especially with the recent launch of Windows Phone 7.

Windows Phone 7 is viewed as a consumer based product and with good reason. Not only is the development platform not as flexible as previous versions, but the OS itself is typically delivered across a range a smartphones, perhaps reinforcing the consumer focused approach.

Apple and Blackberry also offer a great range of consumer devices which can often tempt facilities and service providers to look towards these devices. But in reality, are these devices a wise choice for Facilities departments and service providers after considering two common questions:

1. Is the device suitable for the environment?
2. Can the scan assets effectively?

After considering these questions, available devices are heavily restricted. Of course, with the correct software consumer devices can use the camera as a means of scanning assets, and you could invest in rugged cases for the devices, but practically speaking is they the best fit solution?

After lengthy discussions with hardware manufacturers and suppliers, it is suggested that Windows Phone 7 will not be the next step in mobile OS. It is unlikely that Apple or Blackberrys OS will be used either. This leaves Android as the most logical choice for rugged devices, or Windows Phone 8 once its released.

Pidion (http://www.mypidion.com/) offer an excellent range of rugged devices and have already released Android based versions on both their BIP6000 and BM170. Therefore, could Android be future mobile operating system for rugged devices for use within the facilities and service management industry? Early indications seem to support this and Tabs FM have already begun investigations and development on a range of alternative mobile OS’s, to continue to provide clients and the industry with leading mobile technology for field engineers.

www.tabsfm.com -computer aided facilities and service management software

...more than just software