Overview

Based in Bathgate, West Lothian, Johnston Fuels has been on the road since 1965 distributing oil, kerosene, LPG and biomass products to over 30,000 domestic and commercial customers across Scotland and England.

Mother Technologies has been their long-term IT support provider over the last 10 years, progressing from front-line IT support to delivering a full suite of connectivity, telecom and private hosted services.

Challenges

Johnston Fuels are a growing business, acquiring subsidiary businesses and new depots as they expand. Their main challenges involved;

• Connecting to, standardising and centralising acquired businesses ICT systems.
• Ensuring system and network capacity between headquarters and regional bases.
• System resilience and disaster recovery facilities.
• Accurately planning for and managing IT capital expenditure.

Solution

Mother Technologies conducted a project consultation with key personnel at Johnston Fuels then fully planned, managed and installed a complete hosted IT and telephony system.

Delivery

Contract Award Date: 5 September 2012

IT Go-live Date: 3 March 2013

Telecom Go-Live date: 10 March 2013

• Managed ADSL circuits were specified and delivered to each location. These were tied together in one of Mother’s datacentres to form the MPLS network infrastructure required for all site to site and internet connectivity.
• A hosted firewall was installed in the datacentre and configured for a centralised internet breakout point common to all sites.
• Quality of Service policies were applied to the MPLS network to ensure traffic for voice and business critical applications were prioritised.
• A new virtual desktop was built with all of the latest Microsoft application versions.
• All of Johnston Fuel’s 3rd party business critical systems were integrated into the new virtual desktop infrastructure, including their ERP, Fuel Distribution and Vehicle Fleet Management systems.
• System pre-testing was performed with selected users before go-live date.
• The hosted IT system was implemented over one weekend to minimise business disruption. All staff logged off of their system on Friday retuning on Monday to new virtual desktops populated with all of their applications, business and personal data. Two engineers from Mother remain on onsite on the Monday & Tuesday to ensure completely smooth user transition.
• A highly polished and complete service was delivered with huge attention to detail, leaving no part of the transition unconsidered.

Results

• Johnston Fuels lost minimal staff time on the system switch over and suffered no impediment to business operations.
• They now have faster and consistent connectivity that fully meets their business needs and a user experience that is standardised across their branch locations.
• Their onsite equipment was eliminated, allowing for an office refurbishment and significant power savings.
• They moved from having unpredictable ICT costs to a planned operational expenditure model, avoiding upfront capital costs and allowing planned monthly cost allocation per head.
• They are future-proofed for continued business growth, with a fully scalable, uncontended and resilient system delivered at lower cost than the previous one.

“In 2013, Johnston Fuels identified a number of issues with our current IT Infrastructure, and working with Mother Technologies, planned and implemented a fully hosted IT & telephony system. Their engineers worked closely with our I.T dept. to create a robust hosted desktop platform that has greatly improved user experience and allowed all depots to be easily managed and supported by head office. Their knowledge and experience has been instrumental in improving our systems and processes and ensured full connectivity across the entire group. It has helped to ensure continued business growth.”

Stephen Wilkins, I.T Operations Manager, Johnston Fuels Ltd

Case Study