While Wessex Water is a name synonymous with utility infrastructure, their Recreation department faces a vastly different set of challenges.
Managing public spaces like fisheries and recreational green spaces involves inspecting a wide variety of assets from picnic benches and playgrounds to lifejackets and boats.
The Challenge: Beyond Pipelines and Pumping Stations
For Fisheries and Recreation Manager Phil Timings and Senior Recreation Advisor Karen Kingston, the goal was to find a system that offered professional-grade options without the rigid, "one-size-fits-all" constraints of traditional enterprise software.
They needed a digital solution that could prove legal compliance for Legionella testing one minute and track the maintenance of a footpath the next.
The Solution: A Bespoke Framework for Safety
The team implemented Papertrail, a digital inspection and scheduling platform that prioritises flexibility. For Karen Kingston, the primary draw was the ability to create multiple, specific checklists for a single asset, and on varying frequencies.
This allowed the team to schedule different types of inspections based on types of items, honey pot areas of sites or specific safety requirements. To solve the problem of identifying identical assets in the field, they integrated NFC (Near Field Communication) and location tags.
This ensured that even if a picnic bench was moved or a way-marker was one of four in a single area, the staff could identify the specific asset, view its history, and log a defect with absolute certainty.
"Inspection scheduling is really helpful. You can have multiple checklists and schedules for each item depending on what is required, so it’s flexible for your needs. It is great at ensuring assets are inspected at exactly the appropriate time. The offer is always developing through customer feedback and the customer service has been really great."
- Karen Kingston, Senior Recreation Advisor
Data-Driven Maintenance and Legal Compliance
One of the most significant shifts for the department was moving from simple "Pass/Fail" checklists to granular data collection. Phil Timings highlighted the critical nature of their Legionella testing and boat inspections.
By using text-entry fields instead of checkboxes, staff now record the exact water temperatures required by law, creating a robust audit trail.
"We use a text box to record the volume of water that is drained from the internal cavity of each boat. This means that, we could go back and track the amount of water the boat is taking on and we can see if it’s getting significantly worse.
It’s the same for other checks like Legionella. By law, we are required to keep records of temperature readings from outlets, so by using a scheduled checklist and capturing these temperatures, it helps the team manage their tasks and keeps all our maintenance records in one system.”
- Phil Timings, Fisheries and Recreation Manager
A Partnership Built on Feedback
The success of the implementation at Wessex Water stems from the system’s ability to evolve alongside the user. As Phil Timings noted, the system provides the underlying structure but leaves enough freedom for the team to bespoke the application to a range of different contexts, from fisheries management to footpath obstruction checks.
This adaptability, combined with a customer service team that actively integrates user feedback into new features, has allowed Wessex Water to consolidate their processes. Instead of juggling multiple tools, they have a single, user-friendly interface that ensures their public sites remain safe, compliant, and well-maintained.
"The word I use is it’s an adaptable system. It’s got the mechanics in it, but it’s got enough freedom and flexibility for it to be bespoke and applied in a range of different contexts. What it’s good at is user-friendliness, getting the basics right, and being able to adapt and change things to a range of different situations."
- Phil Timings, Fisheries and Recreation Manager
About Wessex Water
Wessex Water is a regional water and sewerage company serving around 2.9 million customers across the south west of England, including Dorset, Somerset, Bristol, most of Wiltshire and parts of Gloucestershire and Hampshire.
Headquartered in Bath, its teams maintain thousands of assets across a network of treatment works, pumping stations and operational sites, each subject to statutory inspection regimes including LOLER and PUWER.
Wessex Water on Papertrail: The Numbers
- 13,000+ inspections completed and certified
- 1,600+ defects caught
- Monthly inspections up almost 4x since rollout
- 1,100+ asset records kept up to date automatically
- 100+ sites and locations
- 100+ recurring inspection schedules
- 1,400+ photos and evidence files attached
- 13 active users
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