Main menu

Venture on certification. The way to certification will open your eyes – this is the recommendation made by Mungos. Certficates create confidence.

The mongoose has, at least, been known from the story told in the Jungle Book. In the Indian fable, the mongoose is the protector of mankind. In his battle against the cobra, the mongoose dazzles by his speed of reaction. For the mongoose is not immune to the effective poison. Thus the mongoose was at the origin of the foundation of Mungos Company in 2005. Mungos, which is a subsidiary of Infrastruktur AG, is responsible for safety, security and cleanliness on Austrian train stations. Thus the slogan runs “Sicher und Sauber” (“Safe and Clean”). Mungos has been certified by Quality Austria acc. to ISO 9001, SCC since 2007 and also is certified acc. to ISO 14001. DI Axel Dick, Quality Austria GmbH, talked with the IMS Manager Sonja Heidinger and the Managing Director Karl Prettenhofer.

qualityaustria: What are the business fields of Mungos?
Prettenhofer: The key services provided by Mungos include cleaning of monuments, buildings and façades, our security services and our Lost + Found Service, which we have offered for two years. The field of event management has been added. 130 train stations are served by about 450 employees 24 hours a day on 22 bases. It is required to think and act in an interdisciplinary manner. Security team members will directly hand lost property they have found over to the Lost + Found Service. Our cleaning team will help passengers whose mobility is restricted to step in. Each employee of Mungos will give orientation aids to the customers of the stations if, e.g., a station is being rebuilt and will inform the passengers on the times of departure of the trains. As you can see, we attach utmost importance to flexibility. For this helps us to gain synergies!

qualityaustria: What triggered the initiative to go for integrated management?
Heidinger: Six years ago we were still providing outsourced services as the autonomous company of Mungos. At that time we were given a long questionnaire. Mr. Prettenhofer asked me to study this. I had to find out that I did not really know how to answer the questions about many items relating to the topics of quality, environmental protection and safety and security. We were entering a new territory. Thus I attended the first qualityaustria Trainings about Quality and Safety Management. This helped me to get a grip on the new task. Today I am responsible for the IMS.

qualityaustria: As a service provider, Mungos, which has a certified integrated management system, is one of the pioneers in Austria. What was the motivation for certification?
Heidinger: Mungos wants to stand out against other providers. On the one hand, a tendency to requiring Certificates begins to show on the market. On the other hand, we want to give a challenge to our suppliers and act as a role model. Now central purchasing has taken up concrete environmental standards and labels, which are taken into account when placing orders.

qualityaustria: What has been changed by the preparations for certification?
Prettenhofer: You start to see things with different eyes. You will look at things that you have not seen before. We have systematically looked at all the areas, analyzed them and identified things that are not sharp enough.
Heidinger: There were some “aha” effects. My personal experience generally was the following: It is true that everybody is convinced of the big importance of a healthy environment. Nevertheless, people do not really know what to do concretely. Environmental Managers are people taking care of things and, what is even better, important drivers. We have analyzed the machinery. Among the 164 cleaning devices, we could segregate 58 because the devices were obsolete and their energy needs had meanwhile become much too high. This saves maintenance work and unnecessary power consumption. Or let’s take an example from chemistry: When stocktaking, we identified 150 different cleaning agents. After several steps, we could reduce the need for different cleaning agents to 30 while focusing on environmentally friendly products. This facilitates purchasing, administration of the material safety data sheets, correct storage and adequate handling of the said operating materials. The employees can be trained more easily. The station is clean, the environment is saved, and health protection is taken into account. The measures could be implemented easily. For the employees were interested and motivated themselves. For example, employees active in the security service asked themselves the following question: Why do people take the service cars to go to the stations in Vienna instead of taking public means of transport? Now the security team mainly uses the public means of transport in the daytime and uses the car at night outside the operating hours. The result is significant. Every year we save 79,000 kilometres or little less than 10 tons in the Eastern region. This helps us to reduce fuel consumption by some thousand litres of diesel, decrease use of the passenger vehicles and be with the customer even longer.

qualityaustria: What benefits do you see in certification?
Heidinger: We have reduced complexity (see the example of the chemicals). The audit also served as a trigger. An audit opens up new perspectives and points of view. The buildings in which bases are housed are rented from Infrastruktur AG. Responsibility for maintenance and inspection of, e.g., lift systems or test labels of fire extinguishers devolves on the lessor. However, the Division Managers make a site visit once a month and will report any items to Infrastruktur AG via e-mail. By now the municipalities have more confidence in us. Today it is easier to obtain the approvals required for withdrawing water. Our customer ÖBB (Austrian Railway Company) integrated environmental certification in the service agreement as soon as we had announced to start the project. – ORIGINAL NICHT KLAR: Die Umweltzertifizierung wurde von unserem Kunden ÖBB nach einem Aviso, wir starten nun das Projekt, auch gleich in die Leistungsvereinbarung aufgenommen.

qualityaustria: Based on a topical study made by qualityaustria, we know environmental training plays a very big role in the companies certified according to IMS. How do you inform and train your employees?
Heidinger: We have comprehensively trained the Area and Division Managers in internal environmental protection. This has helped us to derive the most important dictates for our employees. Then the employees were trained by the Division Managers or in cooperation with me. The training measures fell on fertile ground because the employees saw their own benefits and brought in their own experience. Now environmental protection is integrated in the Continual Improvement Process. Anybody can complete and bring in the CIP Cards alone or with the support of the Division Manager. However, it still needs to get into its stride. Our target consists in getting two suggestions from each employee.

qualityaustria: What priorities do you plan for 2010?
Heidinger: During their site visits, our employees use so-called Proxypens for reporting and documenting that everything is ok on the location xy (“Alles in Ordnung am Standort xy”). The Proxypens can only be operated by means of batteries. Unfortunately there are no fitting rechargeable storage batteries. Every month there will be about 80 empty batteries. Throughout the year, this leads to little less than 1,000. In May, we will have a pilot test, where we change the system over to mobile phones. Only certified suppliers will be considered. I want to be more certain. As experience has shown, certified suppliers will act more professionally in terms of material safety data sheets and slips accompanying dangerous goods. I can be confident there will be the right documents. In order to reduce waste, the suppliers will also be asked to take back the containers provided for the cleaning agents. Many agents have already accepted that.

qualityaustria: What would you recommend to other service providers?
Prettenhofer: Venture on certification. Certification will open your eyes for many things. It will help you to scrutinize everything so that you can develop further.

qualityaustria: Thank you for the interview. We wish Mungos continued success with quality