Can you tell our readers a bit about Visual Approvals?
Visual Approvals is dedicated to empowering Australia’s building surveying businesses by simplifying the intricate building approval processes. Our mission is to reduce risk and foster growth within building certification businesses. We envision our software setting new standards of excellence in the building certification and regulatory sectors.
Streamlining approvals through extensive experience
Since our founding in 1998, we have deeply engaged with the building certification industry. From the outset, we have collaborated closely with essential stakeholders like building certifiers, engineers, architects, and town planners. This hands-on experience provided us with invaluable insights and feedback about the building approval process’s complexities and requirements. Leveraging this knowledge, we developed our software to streamline business processes and enhance efficiency.
Simplifying approvals with robust software
The complexity of the building certification process meant our goals were not achieved overnight. However, through continuous industry collaboration and rigorous software testing and refinement, we have succeeded. Today, we proudly offer a comprehensive building approval software solution that streamlines the entire process and equips certifiers with the tools they need to excel.
Committed to meeting industry needs
Our commitment to meeting the evolving demands of the building certification industry drives us to continually engage with industry stakeholders and seek improvement opportunities. Visual Approvals is dedicated to adapting to the changing building approval requirements and regulatory standards across all states and territories, delivering significant efficiency savings to the building and construction industries.
Why does Visual Approvals use AlwaysUp?
Many of our customers rely on Dropbox or OneDrive for their documentation, requiring them to be always operational. AlwaysUp ensures that the tools run continuously, regardless of whether the user is logged in, as long as their machine is turned on.
When a new or existing client opts to use Dropbox or OneDrive for their documentation, we install AlwaysUp to support this requirement.
We’ve been using AlwaysUp for the past ten years, and it has consistently met our needs.
What business problem does AlwaysUp solve?
We needed a solution to ensure that Dropbox or OneDrive were always running, facilitating seamless document transfer between the cloud and the customer’s PC.
To explain a bit more, understand that our customers are constantly on the road performing building inspections. Each person uses an iPad to complete necessary documents which are then copied to the cloud (OneDrive or Dropbox) and shared with the main office. It’s important that those documents are uploaded quickly and seamlessly.
By running AlwaysUp on the PC in the main office, we can rest assured that the documents edited on the iPad will make their way to the customer’s office, even if no one is in the office (or logged on to their main computer).
How many installations do you manage?
We’ve purchased an Unlimited OEM license for AlwaysUp, allowing us to install as many as needed to support our growing client base.
Did you evaluate any competitors of AlwaysUp?
Not really. We started out thinking we’d have to develop our own solution but we decided against that once we found AlwaysUp. We didn’t feel the need to look elsewhere because:
#1: AlwaysUp provides exactly what we need
We were able to install OneDrive and Dropbox in AlwaysUp in minutes. Any software we developed would be doing exactly the same thing — but then we would be responsible for maintaining it ourselves, and that would distract us from our main work.
#2: We received excellent product support
The team at Core Technologies is very attentive. They get back to us promptly whenever we have a question or hit a problem. For example, when Dropbox stopped working as a Windows Service for some of our customers a few years ago, Core Technologies was able to resolve the problems in a few weeks.
What are your favorite features of the software?
The most appreciated feature is its reliability. AlwaysUp keeps Dropbox running smoothly and notifies us if the system stops. While it likely offers more functionalities than we use, the features we rely on are stable and dependable.
Any other comments?
Working with Core Technologies has been a great experience. Their support team is responsive and helpful. We would highly recommend AlwaysUp to others needing a solution for continuous program operation.
In particular, AlwaysUp has been crucial for our iPad app, which uploads and downloads documents to and from Dropbox or OneDrive. The continuous availability ensured by AlwaysUp allows our clients to sync documents at any time, day or night, enhancing the overall solution we provide.