H2OCIS, Ultan Technologies’ Billing and Customer Information solution for Water Utilities, provides mapping functionality for free.

Up to now, Water Schemes have paid Engineering companies up to €40,000 to map all of their water meters. They got a a static map and an AutoCad disc for this €40,000.

Documentation on how to access the mapping functionality in the H2OCIS product is available here.

Maps in H2OCIS are interactive:

• Details about any item can appear on the map – for example a meter’s current reading can appear beside the meter
• New items (meters and customers) can easily be added by the H2OCIS user and old ones removed
• The user can search functionality to only display selected items on a map – for example a map showing only the meters on a particular route
• They can zoom in and out
• They can display a road map view, an aerial view or a combination of both

If a Water Scheme has already mapped their meters, they can easily upload all co-ordinates to the system. If they don’t already have co-ordinates, they can use H2OCIS to plot each customer and meter on a map.

In future versions of the product, additional functionality will be available including:

• Phone applications for reading meters – these will use the maps and will notify the reader when they are close to a relevant meter

• The ability to attach a photo to each meter – great for accurately showing its location

• Route planning for meter reading – including creating routes on popular Satellite Navigation systems
• Plotting a complete pipe network
• Plotting items such as booster pumps, scour valves, stop valves, sluice valves, treatment facilities, sources, intake pipes, source catchment areas, etc
• Relevant information on each of these items (e.g. the turn direction for a valve)
• Plotting possible leaks
• Different icons for each of the different types of items on the map

If you have access to the product you can see the maps in action now – see documentation here.