Paige's Music of Indianapolis, IN, serves over 300 schools weekly through the sale and rental of musical instruments. Many rentals were being handled manually via phone with each order taking up to 30 minutes. Staff members were inundated with filling out forms, filing, and faxing. Management needed to find a solution to simplify this process to increase customer satisfaction, save time and improve ROI.

Challenge

Paige's Music of Indianapolis, IN, serves over 300 schools weekly through the sale and rental of musical instruments. Many rentals were being handled manually via phone with each order taking up to 30 minutes. Staff members were inundated with filling out forms, filing, and faxing. Management needed to find a solution to simplify this process to increase customer satisfaction, save time and improve ROI.

Solution

PlanetJ worked with Solution Serve, LLC and Paige's managers to build a user-friendly Web based application for students and parents to handle rental purchases. This was done quickly using WOW (Web Object Wizard) and Paige's backend IBM iSeries. The WOW rental application simply connects via URL.

Requirements Details

Paige's Music, AKA "Indiana's Premier Music Education Superstore" offers many online services to their customers including student info, delivery status, director assistance, and job postings. They sell pretty much everything related to the support of Indiana based bands and orchestras. The high volume of online rental applications was requiring Paige's employees a countless number of hours on the phone and filling out forms. Students and parents were also delayed in receiving service and response.

Paige's desired a rental site connecting to iSeries data to allow not only online rentals but also returns, exchanges, repair, loaner tracking, and delivery of instruments, accessories, and instrument care packages.

How It Works

Access Paige's Music Online and enter the rental application by the red circle in the center of the screen as shown.
This application allows users (parents, students, directors) the ability to electronically process and pay for their rental equipment.

After clicking the online rental button above, the following screen will appear.

The "debut" page introduces the user and instructs how to proceed.By pressing on the green "Go" button, a URL directs the user from the external ISP site into a WOW driven application within Paige's.

School search can then be performed. User needs to only type in the first letter of the school. Once the school has been determined, the data-driven application provides real-time information on delivery times, instrument availability at that location, and further steps to rent. Some schools host band, others orchestra. The data returned is school specific.

Once selecting the type of instrument, the application steps the user through the rental/purchase.

The five step process above is all it takes for Paige's customers to rent or purchase and deliver their band or orchestra instrument and accessories.

Hardware and Software Overview

WEB Server: Windows server connecting to iSeries

Processor: Integrated x-server running Windows 2000

RAM: 2 GB

Database Server: AS/400 DB2 400

Security: OS400 Object Security

Summary

WOW Enterprise 6.3.5 was used to power Paige's Music online rental application by connecting to their iSeries data. Mark Goff of Paige's Music was excited about the results ~ "I can't tell you how much easier the new online rental process has made our lives during this busy back-to-school season. It enables us to cut a 20-30 minute telephone call down to less than 5 minutes. The customers are thrilled to learn of the option when they call at the "last minute". So far we have over 150 online rentals & we're only a few days into the season. Thought you might appreciate a few words of congrats. It gives us great hope for things to come as we implement the full system later this year."

References

www.planetjavainc.com

www.paigesmusic.com