By Bill Sutherland – Operations Director of Guardian electrical Compliance, part of PTSG Electrical Services Ltd
BAE Systems Marine is based in Barrow in Furness. We have maintained a strong collaborative relationship for over 10 years, working directly with BAE engineering teams, this is despite the presence of well-established FM providers. The BAE facility is enormous, it covers over 300 acres – or put another way 5 square miles – comprising 170 buildings and production halls. Over the years we have inspected and tested over 3250 distribution boards, produced 930 electrical drawings in CAD format.
In the early days we delivered the reports and drawings in a van, there were that many. That is when everything was printed – thousands of A4 pages and A0 drawings all neatly put in binders, plus a digital copy on CD (remember those?!). There was a cellar storage area that contained all the files, and no one could find anything!
In recent years the delivery of reports has migrated to the TraQit platform. It took a few attempts to pass the stringent security protocols of storing data on a website, but now they use the system every single day. This includes senior engineers responsible for maintaining this vast site, designers for new installations, Health & Safety teams to check on the status of their electrical compliance, and technicians that need to work on circuits.
There is a level of trust in our ability to undertake inspection and testing on a high-security facility, part of our country’s national defence. We do have to jump through hoops at times. BAE understandably want the same engineers to attend site. They have a high level of security clearance, empirical site knowledge, the site engineering teams know and recognise the team. Obviously, we do not get free reign to go where we want on this high-security facility.
Without doubt, BAE Systems continue to use Guardian because we are always there. The technical support we provide, the quality of our reporting, maintaining and updating their data through our TraQit support team is highly valued by BAE; we keep them compliant (asfarp).
