With high competition and increased demands for speed and efficiency, warehouse operators must always be on the lookout for ways to improve productivity. Mobile cart workstations are built for just that. The ability to take your work process mobile has many time-saving and cost-saving benefits, especially for those in warehouses and factory settings, where efficiency depends on mobility.
Here are five reasons your warehouse may want to look into mobile cart workstations:
Accelerate Data Capture and Inventory Handling
While it may not seem like it, the ability to keep employees closer to the point of activity saves significant time. True, you may shave only a few seconds off the time it takes for an employee to walk back and forth to a fixed station, but that adds up over time.
By scanning and printing right at the source, you can increase quality, accuracy, and speed of data capture. When processes are more efficient, your workers can have more time to do their jobs thoroughly and double-check the quality of their work, as well. Having a mobile computer, printer, and scanner station allows employees to take their work with them, saving on both time and labor costs by equipping workers to work more productively.
Empower Your Employees Without Limiting Capabilities or Compromising Accuracy
A mobile cart workstation allows you to improve efficiency in many ways. In addition to computers, printers, and scanners, a mobile cart offers workers access to critical business systems. They can have instant access to their WMS system, ERP, and other network applications, no matter where they are in the facility.
Mobile carts empower workers to perform daily transactions and tasks without limiting their capabilities or compromising accuracy. They’ll no longer have to spend cumulative hours walking back and forth between the receiving and storage areas just to input data and print labels. They can also eliminate bottlenecks in the inventory process, helping to streamline employee workflow and free up more space in the warehouse by doing away with fixed workstations.
Improve the Return Process
Returns are often a necessary evil. The different ways each returned product must be processed tends to place a burden on warehouse operations and slow down productivity. With a mobile workstation, the workers responsible for processing returns will have the necessary information they need right at their fingertips. Mobile carts offer access to inventory, accounting, data capture, and order system information so they can quickly determine the ultimate disposition of the returned merchandise.
With the ability to have updates to data reflected in the inventory system in real time, workers can fulfill new orders, while customers can be credited faster. This not only improves productivity within your workflow, but it increases customer satisfaction.
Eliminate Extension Cords and Power Strips
Large industrial extension cords are not just merely an eyesore—they’re hazardous to the health and safety of your workers and equipment. A mess of extension cords makes your warehouse floor look messy and unprofessional, and it poses a risk to busy employees that can easily trip and fall. Any assets they are carrying may be damaged, but more importantly, your employees themselves may be injured.
A mobile computer station solves this problem by utilizing a rechargeable power pack, which eliminates the need for a wired connection to the mains. The batteries on mobile cart workstations are built last a full shift. Some even last up to 15 hours. Essential components like monitors and keyboards are built into the mobile computer station, so there are no wires needed to connect them together.
A Happy Employee is an Efficient Employee
Employees can quickly become demoralized if they realize they are working in an inefficient environment. Workers want to know you value their time, and don’t want to waste their hard labor walking back and forth unnecessarily from the point of data capture to the stationary computer.
Mobile workstations eliminate the need for trips across the warehouse, and enable workers to carry less equipment with them back and forth. By providing your employees with a mobile cart, you are making their jobs more comfortable and untethering them to stationary workstations, allowing them to increase productivity and output.
Conclusion
The times are changing, and warehouses now must embrace new ways to improve mobility and streamline workflow. Over the course of the week, mobile carts can eliminate hours of time spent on unnecessary trips, greatly improving speed and efficiency all around.
Informs, Inc. offers these ergonomically-designed mobile computer stations for enterprises looking to increase productivity and improve quality of life for workers on the job. By investing in mobile carts, you can equip your employees to speed up processes, and set yourself up to stay competitive and profitable in your industry. For more information on our mobile cart workstations, contact Informs today.
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