Episode Summary
In this episode of RecChat our host Bret Alarcon is joined by Director of Implementation, Tom Valley and Product Management Director, Patrick Hayden to discuss the benefits of migrating your 10.3 RecTrac database to the Next Gen 3.1 version of RecTrac. The group touches on migration steps, time frame, training options and materials, COVID Business Impact, and new 3.1 features.
Recording
Transcript
Bret Alarcon 0:00
Okay there we go. Hello, everybody. We are live. So hello and welcome today's RecChat brought to you from sunny northern Vermont. I'm your host Bret Alarcon. I'm going to be filling in for Zach Malloch for today. So today I have with me Tom Valley. Who, here, there's Pat. There's Pat Hayden and Tom Valley. There we go
Tom Valley 0:32
I'm here, I'm here.
Bret Alarcon 0:33
Hey, everybody else. I also have Cullen, with me. He's gonna be moderating for today.
Cullen Barber 0:39
Hey Everybody,
Patrick Hayden 0:40
Hey everybody.
Bret Alarcon 0:40
So today we have for you a special RecChat about migrating to 10.3. So if you have any questions, please ask them in the q&a section down below. It will pop up a little box where you can ask all your questions. If we don't have enough time for all your questions, we'll let you know the best way to contact us to further find out about how to get your question answered. So how are you doing today, Tom and Patrick?
Tom Valley 1:12
Hey, Brett, we're doing great. Thanks. Thanks for the intro. Welcome, everybody to today's RecChat. As Bret mentioned, we're going to talk specifically about why now might be a great time to migrate from 10.3 to 3.1. There are a number of reasons for that. We're also going to talk about what that what that process might look like. And some of the neat benefits of RecTrac 3.1. So let's jump right into it. What we're really finding these days during these unprecedented times, people are challenged to work differently, think differently. Typically, in the Parks and Rec world, this time of the year, you're really gearing up for your summer programs, and you're you're straight out and not thinking about training or migrating or having anybody on site. But as this crazy COVID Times have has taught us here we we are thinking differently now. So while things are slow, or and maybe rec centers are not open, or fully open at this time, it's a great, it's a great opportunity for people to take advantage of migrating to 3.1. And taking advantage of all the features that 3.1 gives us. We're actually in the midst of like 30 open projects right now, with probably half those are migrations remote migrations were typically were on site. So we're now doing them remotely. As you can see some of the tools that we have available to us today with Zoom teams, cameras have really been beneficial in that whole process, you know, looking and talking to people and seeing reactions has, has really benefited that whole progress progress process. So we as we, as we kind of go through and talk about what that process might look like. It looks you know, how it works today is the process is kind of broken up into chunks, where you know, it's more digestible training opportunities that you might have. So we would start that process out doing a remote migration, a test migration for us, we would take your 10 Three database, we'd migrate it into a three, one format. And that would be the basis on which we would do our training. So we would set up the training, you know, in like, you know, one to two hour formats to get going until we actually choose the go live date. And that would be kind of a full day of going live. So what we found doing this remotely instead of having us on site where we're there for 8, 9, 10 hours a day, and we're giving you a lot of information all at once, it now can be broken down into more consumable training methods, or training time. So So that's been one very beneficial thing. Most people do have access, or are looking for access to RecTrac from from home, or maybe some people are still working at the office. And certainly one of the benefits of migrating to 3.1 is having that browser based having a browser based solution where you can have access to RecTrac from anywhere as you have Internet. So that would be a big, big plus there. Some other benefits to 3.1 include, you know, there's minimal client install, so everything's kind of run on the back end from the from your server. The only client install you might have would be our VIC our vermont integration client. And that is just simply for any PCs that access hardware directly. Popping drawers printing, and things of that sort, the 3.1 interface, you know, now that we're six plus years into this. So it's, it's, the interface is much cleaner, it's more intuitive, it's more simpler to look at, you know, we feel we're at a really good really good spot at this point, not just with the software, but with our process, converting people, we're converting people faster, in shorter amounts of time, and giving, giving them better information. The, the 3.1 software's, you know, extremely customizable as well. So you can, you know, you can customize it to have your own look and feel whether you're a golf course, whether you're, you know, a senior center Rec Center, you can actually have your own your own look and feel screens can be customized wordings, phrases, all kinds of things. And to me, one of the one of the biggest features of 3.1 is the ability, we have a very sophisticated fees and rules engine on the back end. And that allows us to automate complex business processes for our customers. So if you think about the different types of fees that you might offer, or any rules or restrictions, we can handle a lot of them, probably most of them. And what that allows you to do is get provide more services online. As you know, today, more and more people want to pay online, they want to sign up for things online. So that's that's a huge plus, at that.
Patrick Hayden 6:30
I think we've seen two with you know, related to that with with COVID. And with what's going on, like you said, Tom, people wanting to, to work from home in terms of employees, but also more and more people wanting to do those purchases online and avoid having to go into to a front desk to make those purchases, like you said, with the ability to automate a lot of those items that folks are looking to offer with 3.1 plus the fact that with three, one, web track is all kind of responsibly designed and really a mobile first kind of development. So it's all very exact same capabilities, whether you're on your phone or on your desktop, in 10.3, there was a big gap between the mobile WebTrac experience and WebTrac on the desktop and three, one, it's one solution, you know, so everything that you can do from a desktop version of WebTrac, and three, one you can do on mobile, and obviously, with you know, the desire to do more and more of those things online, just because of how people act now, and also in particular, is exacerbated by COVID. Bringing all that stuff online and 3.1 with the mobile capabilities is really advantageous.
Cullen Barber 7:37
Yeah, and maybe add to that, too. You talked about the powerful business logic engine behind the scenes, you know, these days, we're seeing a lot of refunds and cancellations, you know, three, one allows the online cancellation process as well, right? Not that has to be used, but and you can completely customize it right down to you know, modules in certain items, they will allow for it with some very, kind of sophisticated rules, rule sets. So I think that's, you know, an important thing this time, you know, what we're going through right now and seeing a lot of refunds go through. And also just the backup to, to your other point about how much more efficient the process is to migrate than it was, you know, you know, even just a couple of years ago. From the support side, you know, we used to see what I used to call kind of a 3.1 hangover right after the migration there was, there was still a lot of work, you know, for, for our customers to continue to get through to get back to where they felt they were really running solid, like they were in 10.3, you know, the implementation team, you know, Tom's team and everybody else. Deb has worked as well development team. They've really made the process so much more streamlined and efficient, that we don't see that 3.1 Hangover any longer. You know, Tom, maybe your team, your team handles a lot of the follow up too. But again, the amount of follow up we see compared to, you know, now compared to years ago, is just dramatically less and it's it's almost not even a concern right now.
Tom Valley 9:17
Exactly. So we we've grown throughout the process as well, you know, we've we've learned from things that haven't gone well, but yeah, we're cutting the timeframe down, you know, 20 30% easily. So, so now is now's a good time to start thinking about putting on that 3.1 hat and taking advantage of all the great features that it has, and we just touched on them and there's just tons and tons of new features, new capabilities that will help everyone do their jobs and provide more services, you know, for your patrons.
Cullen Barber 9:50
What are some of the, you know, this 3.1 been out for six years, but, you know, over the course of the six years, we've added some new features too. And there's a couple things I can think of that maybe people aren't necessarily aware of that are fairly new, for example, you know, the kiosk maybe, might be something, you know, again, self service. That
Patrick Hayden 10:13
sure, yeah, I think a lot of things that speak directly to kind of the the current times and things are seeing an increase in demand for, you know, with with a lot of things, again, like Tom touched on, obviously, these are unprecedented times, and it's causing people to do things in different ways and utilize things a lot more heavily that were maybe underutilized before kiosk is certainly a big one. So that, you know, provides a whole new way to allow people to kind of do self service can be very contactless entry into into any sort of facility, including not just members, but daily visits, drop ins for classes, recording attendance for classes. And we're seeing a lot of demand for things like the SMS text messaging, just again, more ways to communicate with people make them aware of what's open, what's closed, all that kind of communication you're constantly having to do now. Certainly, InteliTrac, which is our business intelligence analytics solution in three one is something that you know, is getting a lot of utilization these days, because, obviously, as we know, all of our customers, there's there's more pressure than ever to be able to really respond quickly to all those questions for what's the impact of canceling spring, canceling summer delaying camps, and being able to make those business driven decisions is really, really important. And then InteliTrac certainly gives people a lot of those insights to be able to have that stuff readily available, because it's changing daily today, right, you don't want to be running a whole bunch of reports and compiling spreadsheets, with InteliTrac. It's right at your right at your fingertips. Your MainTrac is another one. In three one, we brought MainTrac, right into 3.1 RecTrac, so you can log in. And if you're somebody who does both, you can do both MainTrac and RecTrac tasks, right in the same interface. If you're just the MainTrac user, you have that same modern interface that the Tom talked about earlier. And, again, just trying to move to be less dependent on paper and physical contact and be more mobile. You know, there's a ton of mobile capabilities and 3.1 MainTrac that didn't exist in 10.2 MainTrac and are now part of that RecTrac ecosystem. But like Tom said, the list kind of goes on and on and on. But certainly one of the biggest ones is what Tom mentioned, just the ability of those advanced funeral engines, the ability to get stuff online, get it mobile, and even do things online that maybe you were never doing before. Obviously, you guys all know, well, we're getting a ton of demand right now for new ways to reserve space, you know, people are looking at breaking their fitness centers out to where people have to reserve an hour block when they're going to come and have only 12 people there at a time. And all these sorts of rules that are different state to state, county to county, we can handle all that in 3.1 WebTrac pretty, pretty seamlessly, and give people a nice mobile interface to make those reservations, give the staff a great interface to keep track of that report out on it. And that's something that really is very difficult to do in 10.3. And pretty seamless in 3.1.
Bret Alarcon 13:14
Yeah, for you viewers out there that might have taken a peek at what 3.1 looks like a little while ago. Not too long ago, we released a brand new UI that were you called our next gen release. So if you haven't looked at 3.1, what it has to offer, take another look at it. Our new next gen layout has a bunch of just handy features for your customers and your clerks. One of them. One of my favorite ones is the search filter, which makes finding any program in RecTrac 3.1 a breeze before you would have to know where to find your program and dig down to it. Now you just have a little search bar and type in what you're looking for. It'll give you the results of what you typed and boom, you can even bookmark it. So if you want to look for it again, you just hit that little bookmark and throw it right onto the main splash screen, which is pretty nice to actually looks like we have our first question. We have been on 3.1 RecTrac but our WebTrac is still old. What do we need to do to upgrade?
Tom Valley 14:18
Well, it sounds like maybe we're talking about the splash page, maybe the look and feel of a WebTrac. So if that's the case, we certainly have a number of templates people can choose from more and more people are upgrading to our premium splash pages, which is driven you know more by pictures and in the flow kind of works in that regard versus searching through menus and things of that sort. So if you have any questions about that we can just give me a shout and we can have somebody show you what's what's available with today's options. And really, it's pretty much unlimited as to what you can do with your with your web. You know, you're kind of limited by your imagination. We certainly have templates that we can put in play. Some customers take that to a whole new level.
Patrick Hayden 15:01
Yeah. And we are going to have a, you know, folks have probably heard about some some changes coming to the the UI for Webtracs and modernization efforts there across the board. That that is something I think we actually have a RecChat coming up on that next month. So we will be doing a preview of that. I see another question I'm looking for, they're not gonna, we're not gonna let you 3.1 folks overtake this rec chat that same towards the 10.3 people. Now, obviously, I RecChats, in general are always generally geared towards new features. And a lot of those are on 3.1. So this one, the goal was to really engage with those folks still on 10.3 and talk about the migration process, but we do have one coming up on that WebTrac modernization,
Cullen Barber 15:40
I think for your key sounds like Tom, keep, that maybe their site has not been mobilized. It's not responsive. Okay. So they're on 3.1, but their site's not responsive yet or not fully responsive. So.
Tom Valley 15:55
Okay, yeah. So we can make make changes to that? Yeah.
Patrick Hayden 15:59
Yeah, so that's a good thing to clarify, and we talked earlier about it being responsive, there is still the need to make sure that your kind of city stylesheet is being mimicked just the lines a lot. Like Tom said, that's something they can take care of pretty, pretty easily in something we generally try to do out of the box. But sometimes it's not done, especially with ones that were done a little while ago. But for any of these new migrations for folks on 10.3, that'd be a standard part of the migration that would make sure that that WebTrac was mobile friendly. Thank you.
Tom Valley 16:31
So you know, along to supplement some of the tools that we have, during this process, right, those have all been enhanced. In the last couple of years, we have, you know, great videos, to kind of go through overviews of different processes within within 3.1, there are quizzes now. So we can start getting some reinforcement as to the training you might go through throughout a day. So the whole whole process is just dramatically improved.
Bret Alarcon 16:52
I could speak to that a little bit as well. I've been actually working with some of the implementation team and getting some videos out there on to our support page that you can just follow along. It's actually a course that you can take, it breaks it down to like how to use them your menus or how to use WebTrac and stuff like that. So you go through and then afterwards, you can take a quiz and then that lets our implementer know how much you've picked up due to those videos, and they can focus on what you might need to focus on a little bit more during the training.
Tom Valley 17:27
That's a great point.
Bret Alarcon 17:30
We got another question. So you might want to inform users that upgrading to the new 3.1 new UI that they will lose auto log in feature, we are one of those that are impacted. Now we have to manually log in
Tom Valley 17:42
that the single sign on.
Patrick Hayden 17:44
Yeah, so that's not really the case. If someone was using Active Directory, login for 10.3, they do need to move to the Shibboleth SSL method, which is kind of you know, a more modern, more secure way of kind of industry standard way of handling Single Sign On so I think what keeps probably getting out there is that they were someone who, you know, who they didn't necessarily have the pieces in place to do that Shibboleth SSO, but I think I'm not sure where they're at with that process. I know some of my team Brian was was working with him on that. But it's sort of obviously that's would be part of the kind of migration discussions, if someone's using that Active Directory integration, there's some things we need to keep in mind there.
Bret Alarcon 18:35
And I'm not sure if you made one of our last RecChats, but it was on the SSO
Patrick Hayden 18:41
Yeah he was at that.
Bret Alarcon 18:42
Thank you. I just wanted to make you aware. Just make sure you haven't seen the video yet. Give me more answers. Thank you,
Cullen Barber 18:49
Tom can maybe can you bring us through? If somebody is on 10.3 today and they say "Hey, this is a good time." What what's their steps? What did they what should they do to? You know, who would they call? What would what would the next few weeks or months look like for them?
Tom Valley 19:03
Yeah, great, great question. Thanks. Cullen. Yeah. So you would just shoot me an email, you can email Tomv@Vermontsystems.com. And essentially, what we do today, which we didn't do, you know, years back was start out with a discovery call. So we want to, we want to ask some pointed questions about how you currently use RecTrac. So so that way we can better hone in on where we need to focus how long we think the transition from 10.3 to 3.1 might go. So sort of, well, it would all start with a discovery call. And at that point, we would, once you're ready to move forward, we'd get you on the schedule, depending if you wanted to do you know a remote migration or on site? You know, honestly, we're not sure when we'll be on site at this point, you know, depending on the states and quarantines and all that kind of stuff. That's why even even new installs, we're actually starting on remote. So, so So starting that process off with the migration remotely, essentially, there's like eight core concepts we'd like to bring people through, that are different from 10.3 to 3.1. So we'll set up set up like an hour to 90 minute blocks of times, maybe a couple of times a week with the key players, in review, you know, fees and rules, review, processing, review, the new financials is a lot, a lot more things we can do on the financial end of it as well. So that process will step along. And, you know, we've actually, we've actually taken some of those processes and have turned people around and say, like, four or five weeks were in the past, it was usually a, you know, a three month process, because you were doing your jobs, but they were busy with other things. And but now things are slower, people have more time to dedicate, so we can kind of move through that process a little bit more. So, you know, actually, before we get into the training, we would, as I mentioned earlier, take a copy of your 10.3 database, we would convert that to a 3.1 format. And that would be the basis of what we do our training on. Now, some customers really get into it, and take advantage of all the customizations that you can do. And they'll start customizing their menus, their screens, getting everything set up in that test environment. So when the day of the actual migration comes on, they just simply export all that out and import it into the the live the live database. So you're up and running, saving you days, you know, certainly certainly multiple, multiple hours. So those are new processes that improved in last, say, six months. So as you go through that process, you pick a day of when you want to go live, and then we migrate the live database get you up and running. And certainly these times, it's been a little bit different because most of the doors haven't been fully opened. But but we take that day, we get you up and running, we're testing your hardware, we're installing VIC, we're getting that whole process set, and and then you're kind of off and running. Now some people, after they get up and running for a period of time might opt to have a couple more hours of training, we have found that customers are taking in all the information much easier today, because we're not jamming so much down your throat in the past, we come on site for five days, we've got a lot of information thrown at you, your brain can only take in so much. And you've just you know, so it's just so much at once, where now you kind of ease into it. And we've we've found it to be pretty successful, actually. So we've had some really good feedback from some of our remote remote migrations. But that's kind of so contact us we do a discovery call find out more about how you use the software, maybe there's things that we can help you or add to that. I know more and more people are converting over to our hosted environment, you know, to ensure they have access from wherever they're at. And they're really doing analysis on you know, what it cost them to keep their environment up and running versus what it might cost, you know, VSI to do it. Plus we handle, you know, we handle all the updates, it's easier to support. It's just it's, you know, it's just an overall better experience in that regard. So, and then we get to set up a communication plan, we assigned a consultant, and they they connect with you, you know, multiple times throughout the week during the project.
Patrick Hayden 23:20
We were nice to like you said Tom was going hosted that alleviates a lot of pressure in that migration weekend leading up to it too, right both both on our side in terms of the implementation person having to deal with the server and network stuff. But obviously on their end, too. It's a huge load off their shoulders to have to worry about any of that.
Bret Alarcon 23:39
So just so we're clear. Let's say I just watched this. And now I'm interested in what I going up to 3.1. So what would be the very first thing I wouldn't want to do? Who would I call? Who would I want to contact specifically,
Unknown Speaker 23:54
why don't you contact me? So Tomv@vermontsystems.com. And I can that your team is well versed. We've been doing this for a long time. And you know, we will get somebody set up with a discovery call. Get the quotes over to sales, get the quotes back to the customer customer. Okay, is it and then we're ready to roll.
Bret Alarcon 24:11
Excellent.
Patrick Hayden 24:12
What availability? Is this?
Tom Valley 24:15
Yeah, great question. So certainly, as things have kind of slowed down, you know, our availability is has increased. We are seeing we are seeing quite an uptick, let's say the month of May. So we're, we're every day somebody's contacting us now about migrating maybe access to RecTrac remotely. What options do you have for that? So we could get going relatively quickly in a week or two? Going if somebody if somebody was ready to go, yeah, we're in the past. We might say hey, six months, eight months, nine months down the road. So So and again, we've converted almost 500 customers at this time, so obviously, there's less customers to convert SO
Bret Alarcon 24:59
good. Yep. So have a looks like a comment. It says the 3.1 UI is really cool. Good job, especially the search. Yes. Key. I love the search to my favorite. My favorite feature, and it's probably the most simple.
Patrick Hayden 25:14
Yup, the little things.
Tom Valley 25:15
Patrick, that was all Cullen and I
Patrick Hayden 25:19
appreciate it, guys.
Tom Valley 25:20
Good job on the product.
Bret Alarcon 25:23
All right. So we got about five minutes left of the RecChat. I know the questions were a little light today. So if you do have any questions that you want to kind of throw in last minute, go ahead and ask them and we'll try and get to it before the RecChats ends. So enjoying this nice weather guys.
Patrick Hayden 25:44
I'd rather be out in it and looking through a window.
Bret Alarcon 25:49
I know it's like 80 degrees. I think here.
Cullen Barber 25:52
We had snow last last Tuesday in an hour. Yeah, right. 78.
Patrick Hayden 25:57
Literally snow week and a half ago. Wow.
Tom Valley 25:59
So I've got a question for our participants. So who is open? Who is open? Has anybody opened now? Are they slowly easing into it? What are you know, anybody has any questions or feedback on that? That's interesting for keeping track of all the states and seeing, you know, what's going on there and
Bret Alarcon 26:19
we got some stuff popping in. Joyce has a question, will the remote migration be an option even after COVID has ended?
Tom Valley 26:28
Yes, that's a great question. You know, as far as we're finding, you know, we're just reinventing ways to do our job differently. And I think remote whether it's a migration or implementation is going to be part part of the program. Certainly certainly going remote you're not talking flights, we're not talking you know, rooms or hotels or car so it's it's it's generally cheaper. And I even think with new installs, you know, we could do a lot of the data building. We're doing that right now with the City of Raleigh, so they're huge. You know, Redondo Beach is getting ready Dane County, so we're all starting remote with them, you know, until we can get on site. So I think remotes here to stay.
Bret Alarcon 27:13
All right. We got some stuff popping in now. Megan Hoffman says that they're often offices open for workers, but no programs running yet. Okay. Kristen, from South Jersey says they're not open. Let's see. Todd says we're opening our outdoor spaces June 1 and indoor spaces June 15. Okay, good. And see,
Patrick Hayden 27:36
it looks like over in the q&a, you know, Keith was mentioning in Florida that they're open but no visitors their buildings. Ruth said there'll be opening and reopening in June. Tom says they're mainly just doing refunds at this point. I know that's been the case for a lot of folks the last six weeks or so. And, you know, some others just kind of employees but but closed to the public. So
Bret Alarcon 28:01
Christine says we had a elearning for preschool building has been open for maintenance staff and have gotten a ton of stuff done. So Right. That's good.
Tom Valley 28:10
a time to make or migrate.
Cullen Barber 28:14
We do have a RecChat planned. It may be kind of a special edition on just how to do those reservations. While we're in this COVID state. So we've got some collateral that Tom's team and you know, my team and Pat have been working on the last week or so to help people, you know, navigate and give options, you know, allow customers to do the online reservation then show up with their certain time period. You know, keeping track of Max counts who's in there who's not. So, you know, stay tuned for a invite for a special edition RecChat on reserving space during COVID.
Bret Alarcon 28:58
Alright, it looks like everything's kind of slowed down any final remarks from anybody?
Patrick Hayden 29:05
Send Tom an email.
Tom Valley 29:07
Let's get it going.
Bret Alarcon 29:09
Alright. Well, thank you very much, everybody, for showing up. And we hope you enjoyed today's wreck chat. And I'll see you again soon.
Patrick Hayden 29:19
All right. Thanks, everybody.
Bret Alarcon 29:20
Thank you.
Patrick Hayden 29:21
All right.
Bret Alarcon 29:21
Bye.