Punch List Software for Construction

Punch list apps for the office team, on-site team, and subcontractors
On-site report creation time reduced by 50%
Office report creation time reduced by almost 100%

Expertise

Web & Enterprise Portals

Mobility

Verticals

Construction

Technologies

Ruby on Rails

Mobile

Iflexion builds a suite of punch list apps to streamline defect management in the construction industry. The delivered punch list software reduced on-site report creation time by 50% and made office report creation almost instantaneous.

Months

People

Challenge
Solution
Results

Challenge

Our customer is a US-based startup that unites commercial architects, contractors, and developers, providing SaaS solutions for the construction industry. Being involved in several construction projects, the customer found out that punch list completion was a tedious and lengthy process. All the activities associated with punch list creation and management were performed manually, so a construction project team could spend weeks identifying every existing item that did not comply with the contract specification. It took a lot of time to prioritize project deficiencies and plan further improvements. All that caused messy punch lists and significant time loss. Besides, due to the strict completion schedules, any delay resulted in money loss.

With this in mind, the customer decided to create punch list software that would automate punch list creation and completion and ensure effective collaboration between everyone involved in the process, thus allowing construction project teams to close out projects faster. The customer chose Iflexion for the full-cycle project delivery because of our expertise in both web and mobile application development as well as our product engineering experience.

Solution

Iflexion's enterprise mobile app developers delivered punch list software a SaaS-based application suite that comprises a web application, two mobile applications, and a business administration module. The developed software streamlines punch list management and completion and allows project team members to coordinate their efforts in real time, thus ensuring team integration.

The delivered punch list apps are designed for different user groups. Using the cross-platform mobile application, contractors, architects, engineers, and consultants collectively provide a list of identified deficiencies both on- and offsite. The data provided is automatically loaded to the cloud database available for the office project team in real time. Using the desktop application, office team members process this data and generate reports.

To ensure information protection and convenient work with the appropriate data, we divided the solution into modules where permissions, functionality, and information presentation depend on the user’s role.

Punch List Web App for Office Team

Users: project manager, general contractor, lead architect

Using the web-based module, office team members create new projects, add participants, and manage the overall project through:

Uploading project documentation and assigning roles
Managing and reviewing other users’ activity
Managing existing deficiencies, changing deficiency status
Creating and reviewing punch lists
Generating reports using pre-filled templates

Punch List Mobile App for On-site Team

Users: contractor, architect, engineer, construction consultant

A cross-platform mobile application that supports the offline mode allows users to perform the actual on-site work on the project, including:

Viewing project details
Adding items with deficiencies
Adding deficiency details, including images, audio, and video
Filtering deficiencies and changing deficiency status
Viewing punch list reports in real time

Punch List Mobile App for Subcontractors

Subcontractors were usually the last to receive the list of items they should work on. It slowed down punch list completion process and caused project delays. That is why we created a separate mobile application that enabled subcontractors to be involved since the earliest stages of construction projects being able to address the items assigned to them in real time. The developed application ensures data protection, providing subcontractors with the following permissions:

Viewing deficiencies that are assigned to them
Filtering deficiency status and marking them as ready to verify
Adding images to deficiencies
Receiving reports

Web Module for Admins

We also created a business administration module. It is a separate web module that allows system administrators to manage entities of the solution, including viewing and managing new user information and project page, adding new admin accounts, and managing general system settings.

Process

The customer came to Iflexion only with a punch list software idea and design mockups. Since they didn’t have documented requirements, we involved our business analysts to conduct interviews with the project stakeholders, gather all the necessary requirements, analyze the results, and prepare the project specification. Initially, the customer planned to develop only an MVP. Yet, throughout the development phase, the scope of work was increased by 2.5x, so our team released a beta version of the solution.

With a large scope of work, the customer wanted to quickly see the results and test new features to get faster feedback. In addition, there were shifting priorities and changing requirements throughout the development phase. That is why our team applied the Scrum methodology with 2-week sprints. It allowed us to better plan and control the scope of work for different teams (web and mobile), manage risks, get faster feedback from the customer, and develop features faster. When the active development phase was over, we continued with the Kanban methodology.

The backend was developed on Ruby, and Ruby on Rails with Xamarin being used as a framework for cross-platform development of mobile applications (iOS, Android).

Development Challenges

The solution mockups were created by a third party, while Iflexion implemented a functional application suite based on these mockups. The design was fully custom, without standard UI elements. Besides, design mockups did not fit the standard Bootstrap grid that our team used to convert the provided PSDs to HTML. There was no communication between the third-party company and our team. Yet, the customer wanted to ensure that the solution design matched the provided mockups and didn’t want to make any changes. To make sure that the solution layout corresponded exactly to the provided design, we spent a lot of time creating custom HTML/CSS elements.

Another challenge faced by our team was to eliminate memory leaks when developing the mobile module. To do this, we involved the expert group and continuously tested memory leaks applying different strategies. It allowed us to fix memory issues and build memory-efficient applications.

Results

Iflexion developed a SaaS-based product that automated and streamlined punch list management and completion. The punch list software enabled contractors, architects, engineers, and consultants to effectively coordinate their efforts and close out projects in a timely manner, thus preventing revenue loss. The implemented solution enabled construction project teams to benefit from: