Not every fleet can keep up with PMs and inspections on their own, often turning to mobile maintenance providers. But how do you know the mobile technician, who may have several fleet vehicles to look over, isn’t rushing through the job so they can move on to the next? This is why Coltrain Onsite Fleet Care has launched SHIELD, a proprietary end-to-end field service application that digitizes the company’s 100-point inspection process used by its mobile techs. The digital workflow was designed to give customers peace of mind that the technician did not overlook any issues that could threaten a fleet’s uptime.

SHIELD technically stands for Service History, Inspection, Evaluation, Labor, and Documentation, but Coltrain Co-CEO Kyle Coltrain defines the app as “how we hold ourselves accountable for the quality of our work.”

In his roughly nine years of experience in mobile maintenance—though his family has been doing it for three generations—Kyle said he has seen company cultures that encourage technicians to complete tasks as “efficiently” as possible, turning around jobs with a three-hour standard repair time in only one.

“The technician will look at a trailer, for example, and mark every inspection point as ‘pass’ in a matter of minutes, and move on to the next inspection/repair,” he said. “We have seen many instances where tire tread depths, brake measurements, etc. are all listed at the exact same measurement.”

Of all the things SHIELD blocks, pencil-whipping is at the top of the list.

The time-stamped inspection includes actual measurements such as tread depth and steering play values, supporting photo documentation for failed points, and technician sign-off at the point of service. A technician can skip one of the checklist steps, but cannot complete the job unless all 100 points have been assigned a “pass” or “fail” status.