In the workshop hangs a large and brightly colored flat screen. At a distance, these are just a few colored squares, but a little closer you can see that each square contains lists of car registration numbers. Each square has its own heading; "Created by customer", "Arrived" and "Ready for painter" are among others. The colored screen is the lifeblood of Skærød Autolakerings production.

"This is our shared memory," says Sebastian Billmann Hansen, who is responsible for the production at the painting workshop. "Here we can all quickly see what is going on in tasks and how far we are with those we have started on. It is very effective."

On the screen, he can easily see where bottlenecks may be occurring. With just a single click, he can access detailed specifications of the work on the individual car. "It's just a lot easier than fighting with piles of paper," notes Sebastian Billmann Hansen.

Skærød Autolakerings production management is based on the Tracelink program, which is rapidly spreading among paint workshops. The system is accessible via both PC and smartphone, so you can connect to and see the status of the production anytime, anywhere.

Tracelink was created in 2013 and is on the rise. The company was established with funds from the Industry Foundation with the aim of creating a simple, flexible and inexpensive IT system for planning, managing and documenting production in small and medium-sized enterprises. In 2017, four years later, it is found in companies in several countries.

"The system gives us a simple overview of our production from the moment one of our customers creates an order and until we eventually send an invoice," explains Lis-beth Ørum, director of Skærød Autolakering. "At one end, Tracelink is linked to Autotaks / Forsi, so we can always see what insurance damage we are heading in. The system also has access to Eurotax, so we can easily calculate prices for other types of damage."

Lisbeth Ørum also notes that the system is integrated with the financial system e-conomic. This means that as soon as an employee at the workshop marks a car as finished, an invoice record appears on Lisbeth Ørum's PC. "That means I get billed for my customers faster," she says.

The invoice is created automatically on the basis of the Forsi report or the Eurotax calculation, so normally the invoice can be posted quickly without changes, but on the other hand it is also possible to add extra product lines if extra work is added.

In addition to the company's own employees having access to the system, Lisbeth Ørum has now also provided access for its largest customers. This means that they can create orders themselves and can track the status of the cars they have delivered. It saves a lot of phone calls - and time, which can be used more usefully.

The system also allows you to record time for each task. It can be used both for payroll administration and for post-calculation of insurance claims. But so far, Skærød Autolak has not yet arrived. "We take one step at a time," says Lisbeth Ørum. "We need to be sure that we are using the basic functions of the system efficiently before using additional features. In the long term, we will also use the system for quality recording and photo documentation."

Read more about Skærød Auto Paint.