HCSS vs. Jonas Enterprise Construction Management Software

Our operation uses several pieces of what we call specialty equipment (not used every day on every job). The foreman when finished will give a location of where this equipment is left, this many times can be very vague and lead to a lowboy driver trying to block around to find the piece or driving down a street he cannot get turned around in. With the GPS devices, the driver can pinpoint exactly where the unit is and if he has room to turn around at that location.

Incentivized

If you are looking for several features under one roof, this is your place. No need to try to integrate third-party applications for the most part. If you are a construction company with job costing and/or a service department, I can't think of a reason that it would not be appropriate. If you are primarily retail then I think another software would be more appropriate.

Incentivized

• #1 is support! HCSS is by far the best software support of any product we have ever used. Unlike most software companies HCSS utilizes their support calls to help upgrade their software. When you here them tell you that they will write down a particular issue you come across during a support call if they can't help you then and there they will research and get an answer to you extremely fast. If the software will not do it, you can bet there is a good chance it will be on the list of enhancements you will see come out in the near future.
• Estimating software is very extensive. Their software is capable of handling the smallest estimate all the way to the largest joint venture estimate. It has advanced features that make it extremely useful for analyzing job materials, subcontractors etc.
• HeavyJob is an extremely useful tool for the field to keep the office up to date with job costs. Everything is at the Foreman's fingertips on Tablets to allow the information from the field to get uploaded to HeavyJob manager which then can export to accounting. We are also able to give our Foreman the ability to deal with the Daily and weekly safety needs (Tailgate Meetings, incident Investigation, observations etc.) right on the Tablets thru HeavyJob.

• Payroll - upload Union reports are quick and easy saving time with manual calculations
• Service Billing - create service calls and invoice direct from module, saving duplicate data entry
• Job Cost - Tracks costs and revenues for analysing departments, project managers and techs

Incentivized

• All their apps are on mobile devices. Although there is not a clear company policy on Android versus iPhone. Updates for features lag behind on Android. Some apps are exclusive to one platform making it hard to fully interconnect all programs.

• Contact management. Clumsy and not user-friendly.

Incentivized

As mentioned, user interface appears messy and complicated at initial onset. Training is necessary but becomes easy to maneuver through after solid daily use.

Incentivized

I think it depends on how much you want to put into it. It is a very powerful program, but sometimes learning everything is overwhelming. There are hidden tricks that you learn when you attend webinars and conferences.

Incentivized

I have never had a bad experience or heard of one in 4 years of doing business with HCSS. That is unheard of even with the hurricanes and flooding in Houston area it feels like HCSS was always there and willing to help in every way.

Most of the time they are pretty quick to respond

Incentivized

I was not employed with PPI upon implementation. I would prefer to reference my previous statement, that each company needs to evaluate its culture and address your implementation accordingly. The purchasing company should assign an employee as point person and really take charge of not just the technical side of the implementation (HCSS pretty much handles that), but focus on company culture and training.

Other estimating products I have used consist of ICE/MC2 and MS Excel. ICE was not a good fit for our company, as they have awful technical support and offer very poor training. MS Excel is great for simple estimates where there is not a lot of data being compiled. However neither hold a candle to the power of HCSS Heavybid

I feel Jonas was more equipped to handle multi-state, multi-union payroll as well as multi-jurisdiction sales tax. I wasn't interested in third-party support.

Incentivized

• The biggest ROI for us was the ease of adoption by field personnel.

Incentivized

• With our service department module now being fully integrated (wasn't before), information is more reliable and current. Jonas has helped our bottom line by saving us over 1,000 hours annually in administrative duties.

Incentivized