Management Companies

Facilities 7 offers the management company unique capabilities. The management company organizational hierarchy is normally built as follows:

1) User permissions are defined by the management company, and are structured so that accounting and executive staff (as an example) have access to all regions and all associations at the top, or management company level.

2) A regional manager would normally be given access only to his or her region and related associations.

3) The on-site manager and maintenance staff at an association would normally be given access only to their association.

4) Volunteer members, if given user status at all, are normally restricted to “read” and “print” access only.

Other powerful features allow you to compare data between associations. This allows the management company to be able to see all associations at the same time. This would be used, as an example, to determine if multiple associations were ready for re-roofing. The management company is then in a position to negotiate better pricing for multiple contracts. This can save the individual associations money.

Your access to Facilities 7 can be set up to function directly from your own website. If you have board members accessing the system, this helps build your management company brand. Another unique feature of Facilities 7 is that the management company logo can be inserted into the software (for your associations only) so that it shows on screen any time your staff or board members access the system. The logo can also be set up to appear on select reports that you print. This also extends your brand with your association clients.

Premium Access Program for Management Companies

Facilities 7 Premium Access is available to select management companies.  With Premium Access, Facilities Advisors, Inc. and the Facilities 7 software support group at Percipient Software, Inc. team with the management company to promote the management company’s brand to its association clients.

Facilities 7 Premium Access allows the management company to access the web based Facilities 7 software through the management company’s own website, and make the software available to its staff and association clients.  All screens and reports are designed to display the management company name and logo, thereby continually reinforcing the management company’s brand to its association clients.

Exclusive features of this program are:
•    Access through management company’s website
•    “Branding” with management company name on all screens and reports
•    Hosted on a secure remote server
•    Ability to control user access, even to “read only” status
•    Interface with accounting software to ensure that all transactions are recorded
•    Specially designed schedules presenting budget to actual comparison of reserve activity
•    Ability to generate custom narrative reports
•    Suggested management company reports clarifying that the management company has no liability for the reserve study, but is providing “reserve accounting” schedules as an added, premium service to the association
•    Ability to expand beyond reserves to facilities operations management without having to create duplicate data

There is NO cost to the management company.

The association pays Facilities Advisors, Inc., as the reserve preparer (and distributor for Facilities 7 software), for reserve study services.  The reserve study fee includes the initial year license fee for Facilities 7 software.  For subsequent years, the association can either pay the annual license fee directly to Percipient Software, Inc. (developer of the software), or it can pay Facilities Advisors, Inc. an annual reserve study update fee, which will include the annual software license fee.

For small associations, the annual reserve license fee is $100.  For larger associations, the fee increases based on size of the association, number of transactions, and storage capacity used.

Homeowners Associations

The purpose of the reserve study report is to create a financial forecast; a funding plan for the Association that estimates the timing and cost a future major repairs and replacements of the Association's common area components. The Association uses this reserve study report to determine the annual member assessments necessary to provide funding for the estimated expenditures.  The study is based on an inspection of the association’s common area elements, both real property components and personal property that require replacement or major repair.  Facilities 7 is the most powerful tool available to accomplish this task.

For smaller associations, the reserve study is a relatively straightforward task. 

For large complex master associations, properly preparing the reserve study can become a very complex task, simply because of the large number of components that they maintain.  Facilities 7 data structure was specifically designed with these requirements in mind.  To properly manage large, complex facilities requires the ability to identify components by specific location, and track components in multiple category levels.  The Facilities7 capability of major and minor component levels also allows multiple numbers of minor components to be associated with a single major component.  This “drill down” data capability is crucial for large organizations.

Facilities 7 is the only serious reserve study tool for large associations.

Hotels, Motels, and Casinos

The focus on guest services and profitability place different requirements on a facilities maintenance management system.  The long-term capital replacement budget is simply guesswork for too many lodging establishments.  5% of room revenues is the rule of thumb still used by many in the industry.  But, without a comprehensive analysis to back that up, it’s just speculation.  Better than nothing however, because at least you’re setting aside some money for future replacements.

Facilities 7 removes the guesswork.  With Facilities 7 you can accurately forecast future replacement funding requirements just by using the reserve study module.  You’ll save money on replacements by being able to optimize purchases.  Add the operations module and you can then begin to really reduce costs by integrating your maintenance activities with your long-term replacement activities

Since all units usually cannot be remodeled at the same time, differing replacement time lines emerge and the replacement tracking process just got much more complex, if you want to accurately be able to forecast future expenditures.  The nature of unit interiors also means there are lots of relatively small dollar value components that add up to big dollars.  It means you've got to be able to track your component inventory at that level, where you actually spend the money.  Otherwise, you're just guessing.

Facilities 7 was designed specifically for this level of complexity.  But, unless the software is properly designed to allow you to "see" the component data in natural groupings, you're just going to be bogged down with tons of detail.  Facilities 7 allows you to see detail by location (down to the room within a unit level) so that you could, for instance, see all televisions on the property, just those in units, just those in living rooms, just those on building 4, or just the single television in room 402 in building 4.  With our powerful multiple level category feature, you also don't ever have to look below the one category of televisions is you don't want to.

One last note for lodging facilities.  If you like our reserve module, you’re going to love our operations module.  It not only manages your operating maintenance activities, but contains routines for housekeeping services and member services.  The housekeeping module has a model checklist for unit housekeeping that you can customize for your operations.  The member services module allows you to measure staff response to member requests.  These are designed to help you enhance the guest’s vacation experience.

Timeshare Associations

Timeshare associations common area maintenance responsibilities are more complex than other types of associations, because that maintenance responsibility extends inside the unit.  Taken together with requirements to continually remodel rooms, there's often more money spent on unit interiors than on exterior common area components.  The developers at Facilities 7 have been working with timeshare associations for more than twnety years, and we understand the unique needs of timeshare associations.  Our development team was involved in establishing the ICBI software standards, and demanded the unique requirements in the ICBI standards for timeshare associations that make them so different from whole ownership associations.

Since all units usually cannot be remodeled at the same time, differing replacement time lines emerge and the replacement tracking process just got much more complex, if you want to accurately be able to forecast future expenditures.  The nature of unit interiors also means there are lots of relatively small dollar value components that add up to big dollars.  it means you've got to be able to track your component inventory at that level, where you actually spend the money.  Otherwise, you're just guessing.

Facilities 7 was designed specifically for this level of complexity.  But, unless the software is properly designed to allow you to "see" the component data in natural groupings, you're just going to be bogged down with tons of detail.  Facilities 7 allows you to see detail by location (down to the room within a unit level) so that you could, for instance, see all televisions on the property, just those in units, just those in living rooms, just those on building 4, or just the single television in room 402 in building 4.  With our powerful multiple level category feature, you also don't ever have to look below the one category of televisions is you don't want to.

We understand the different "roles" that exist within the association; whether is is management company executive staff, site management staff, maintenance supervisory or labor staff, or the accounting department that needs to assign that check to some component that got replaced.  Different "roles" need to see different levels of detail, and need to be able to "see" component data in completely different ways.  Because we understand each of those roles, Facilities 7 was designed to serve the specific needs of each of those roles.

One of our long standing sayings is "You can't manage what you can't see."  Facilities 7 allows the association to "see" all of its components, and save money by properly managing their common area components.

Contact us for more information.

Condo Hotels

Condo Hotels are unique in their maintenance needs due to the hybrid of full ownership legal structure combined with the timeshare / hotel style operations.

A typical condo hotel may consist of several different entities operating the same physical facility; the full ownership homeowners association, the rental operations (which may or may not be part of the homeowners association), and very often, a separate association or commercial entity that maintains common areas.

From a maintenance management standpoint, this requires the ability to establish and maintain separate systems for each of the entities, yet potentially with the requirement to combine the data for a single management team.  Facilities 7 is up to the task.  To make it even more complex, some condo hotel associations may require that separate maintenance and reserve schedules by owner.  Again, Facilities 7 is up to the task.