The immediate benefit for pest management professionals is clear: An electronic remote monitoring (ERM) system can increase service efficiency and save technicians time checking traps because they know exactly which traps have activity. But, how exactly does that benefit you?
The short answer: These technologies enable your service technician to receive real-time notifications of pest activity that is recorded with a time stamp. That means you receive a quicker response to resolve an active pest issue, allowing for more prompt corrective and preventive action. But, that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
Shifting From Trap Checking to Always-on Pest Control
No one wants a service technician who simply checks traps. When tasked with checking 100 traps week after week, a technician tends to go into “checknician” mode – simply going through the motion of checking traps. It’s human nature; they have a road map to follow, and they’ll follow that road map, missing those trouble spots, such as new evidence of pest activity, along the way. It also means they are only reacting to what they find versus proactively looking for opportunities to prevent pests.
By using ERM technology to essentially enable the traps to check themselves, the technician can do the job they were hired and trained to do. By freeing up their time from trap checking, technicians can proactively seek out issues that leave you vulnerable to pest problems.
In addition to checking traps with activity alerts, service technicians can spend their time reviewing pest sighting logs, looking for signs of pest activity and seeking out its source, as well as identifying conditions favorable for pests. This proactive and strategic inspection ultimately results in more detailed documentation and reporting of their findings for further root cause analysis, corrective action and overall prevention.
Audit-Ready Elevated Documentation
Another benefit is the documentation that ERM systems can provide. For instance, pinpointed, time-stamped data some of these systems deliver fits right in with the trending and active hot spot data most auditors are looking for when they visit a plant.
Auditors understand that you’re going to have a mouse from time to time, but what they truly want to know is: What did you do about it, how did you protect your product and how will you prevent the problem from happening again. ERM systems make that data readily available.
Data Is Meaningless Without Expertise
There’s no point in collecting data if you aren’t going to put it to use and to do so, you need a strong partner in your pest control service provider. Your service provider’s expertise stretches far beyond killing pests. ERM systems allow your technician the time to apply that expertise while on-site, while also supplying the pinpointed data they need to get ahead of pest issues.
Without that strong partnership, it’s like hiring a heart doctor because you had a heart attack, but you do nothing else to help your heart condition. It’s no different when a food processor suffers a rodent infestation and an auditor finds a problem with their program or there’s a customer complaint. Often, the first reaction is to blame the pest control company. In actuality, pest management success is rooted in a strong partnership between the pest control provider and the facility management.
A pest management program with ERM technology is just one piece of the larger pest prevention puzzle. Knowing where pest activity is happening and identifying the root cause only goes so far in resolving the problem. The preventive steps, such as fixing a damaged door sweep or improving sanitation, is a shared responsibility with facility management.
Investing in Data-driven Pest Control
Everyone likes to save a little money, but your pest prevention program isn’t the place for penny-pinching. Like all new technologies, adopting an ERM system may mean additional costs, but it’s important to realize that no amount of cost cutting is worth it if there’s a recall or a disgruntled customer.
When you hire a pest control company, it’s an insurance policy for pests and an investment in your food protection program. By using ERM technology, you enable your service technician to monitor rodent activity in real time so they can provide a quicker response for corrective and preventive action. That data-driven approach to prevention aligns directly with FSMA and GFSI standards, ensuring not only your compliance, but also that your facility and your product is better-protected in the long-term.
