Founded in 1863, Shiloh Church is one of the oldest African American churches in Washington, D.C.

Sam Franklin, Shiloh Baptist Church facilities manager, and his team are responsible for coordinating facility upkeep and event preparation. While they had previously been using a tool known as FMX, it lacked modern usability options.

The team needed to be able to document and assign various maintenance tasks, as well as improve upon scheduling and preparation for upcoming events. This meant that they needed a tool which included calendaring and reminder functions, as well as the ability to involve multiple parties in the handling of a ticket.

Of course, budgets need to be managed also. This was tricky with their earlier tool because it was cumbersome to attach an invoice directly to the work order. As the search for a new facilities management solution began, this was a critical requirement. The team needed a tool that would allow them to quickly provide information on invoices and related work to the accounting team.

About 10 years back, Sam had used OTRS, so he began to explore if it would be a suitable alternative for Shiloh Baptist Church. Impressed by the modern design and increased adaptability, he started to investigate if it would meet their needs.

Indeed it would. First, adding attachments of photos and invoices was an integral part of OTRS, so their first issue was quickly solved. Second, depending on access rights, multiple people can view and comment on each ticket created. Third, the integrated calendar made scheduling events and reminders, as well as attaching work orders to these, much simpler.

Beyond that, however, OTRS offered the facilities management team reporting and statistics that helped management clearly communicate the current status of projects to the Board of Trustees.

Also important is that the facility management staff at Shiloh Baptist Church is responsible for administering their own tools, as there is not a traditional IT team in place. It was important that they be able to navigate through the administrative dashboard to make changes, such as updating users, services, and ticket types on their own.

Today, OTRS gives the team exactly what they need – the chance to coordinate work and communication among teams through ticketing as well as reporting tools for management/accounting. Events and reminders are tracked and coordinated. Communication among teams is clear. And, accounting has simpler access to invoices.

However, longer term, the team aims to coordinate even more of its work tasks within OTRS. By integrating an accounting tool and adopting some of the OTRS process management functionality, they plan to further reduce administrative tasks and speed up work through increased use of automation.