INSTITUTIONAL SPOTLIGHT the emails started to fly and the phone calls started. In addition to the original response time, I It’s All About The Money Help the financial decision-makers understand the importance of hardware to their facility. By John Truempy, ICML, CRL, CMIL, IFDI S how them the beans. We as institutional personnel oſten must live within tough budget restraints; therefore, sometimes decisions are made based on price alone. For many of us, the problem is when these decisions are made by the wrong people for the wrong rea- sons. When construction projects run over budget for reasons like weather or unexpected problems, they start to look for ways to save money — and hardware is oſten the casualty. I have found there is no malice when the bean counters do cut the hardware; they just don’t know. It can be as simple as on one project I had where they cut the door bumpers from the building. It may seem normal and even practical to cut a $5 item; aſter all, with 100 open- ings, that saves $500. When you combine that with also changing all the doors to stock doors with cylindrical locks, the savings grow and grow. The problems weren’t realized until we answered hour aſter hour of lockout calls. Between the time the building opened and the time the keys were issued to end users, the movers, checklist workers and tenants checking out their new places kept pushing open the doors and hitting the walls — pushing in the button on all the entry function locks. Combine that with a slightly larger door gap, and you get tons of lockouts. In the end you don’t save any money because you wind up having the carpenters install door bumpers anyway — not just because of lockouts but also because the locks end up put- ting holes in the new walls. A savings of about $500 in the end actually cost about $3,000. Shortsighted Decisions In another example, it took six years for problems to appear in places where a project varied from my standard. The standard lock for this application lists for $468, but the lock actu- ally used lists for about $300; they saved $168 per door on the hardware. (The true savings is even less because I am using list prices.) When I got the call for a core spinning, I responded and — in an attempt to solve the problem with a temporary fix — I used an extra spacer. It worked, but by the same aſternoon, the occupants of the room were concerned that the lock might fail again; WWW.ALOA.ORG now had spent time explaining that I would replace the lock with a stronger one. The problem was, I didn’t have a lever lock in the function needed, so I would have to use a knob from the stockroom until I could or- der one. The knob lock lists for $450. The $168 savings was now a $300 piece of scrap. It wasn’t a complete loss because aſter I installed the right lock, we could reuse it elsewhere, if it wasn’t scavenged for a part in the meantime. The Challenge This now brings us full circle. How do we make the bean counters understand why we pick the products we do — products that have given us years of proven, reliable ser- vice? It’s up to us to keep track of jobs like this and show them the beans. Remember, to the bean counters, a lock is just a lock, and all they see is the cost. If we open up the dialogue and explain it in their language, they will oſten become our best supporters. Keep track of your jobs and look at the full overall hardware costs and time use for your institution. On another note: If you haven’t already completed the survey contained in last month’s issue of Keynotes, please do so. You can take the survey online at www. surveymonkey.com/s/AILSurvey2014. hn Truempy, ICML, CRL, IL, IFDI, is employed at the versity of Pennsylvania, ere he’s been a locksmith r more than 21 years. Prior hat, he spent a few years s a commercial locksmith d worked for the State of w Jersey at Trenton State chiatric Hospital. As e first president of ALOA L), the ALOA SPAI divi- f association management n many books focusing on c applications for master key systems, including Advanced Master Keying Skills and Master Key System Specification, Application & Management. He also teaches both fundamental and advanced locksmith subjects. APRIL 2014 KEYNOTES 15
