Section 1 - Assembling the Team
It takes a village to get a successful deployment that meets your needs, covers all your business processes and ultimately gets deployed to your users. For this, you will need a team to support your efforts. Both the OPS-COM team and your organization must bring critical players to the table to ensure success.
Responsibilities of the OPS-COM Team during Rollout
Overall Project Manager - Shannon Jones
You will be assigned a Project Manager from the OPS-COM team. The Project Managers job is to manage the technical deployment of the OPS-COM solution, coordinate the training and setup, and ensure all custom pieces are developed according to the agreed upon client scope.
Account Executive - James Bell
You will also be assigned an Account Executive and a Trainer. The job of the Account Executive will be to gather information on your current business processes and advise on how to transition them to OPS-COM. They will also advise you on the best practices of system setup and help you understand what other clients have done to resolve any issues that came up during deployment. The Account Executive will continue to be a liaison to long after deployment and can advise you on how other products in the suite may improve your organization.
Trainer and Support Liason - John Griffiths
The Trainer will be responsible for explaining how the system works, answering your questions and introducing you to the support process and procedures that you will need after Go Live.
Your Responsibilities during Rollout
Every new client must have a Project Manager that works for your organization. This person must understand your business processes and be familiar with your implementation goals. This is often the Parking Manager. This person will assemble the rest of the team that should consist of the following contacts:
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- IT Contact - Person in charge of SSO integration or other system integrations
- Hardware Contact - Person in charge of the Handhelds, Printers and Cameras if applicable
- Financial Contact - Person in charge of gathering the Hosted Payment details
If you cannot provide a project manager one will be provided by the OPS-COM team for a fee. Our teams will work together to come up with a plan that covers all aspects of OPS-COM deployment outlined below. Your Project Manager must have time to devote to the Rollout and must complete the Rollout documentation (homework 
) before training and setup sessions are booked.
Section 2 - After your Contract is Signed
Setup of Customer Account & Billing
After sign off of the contract, you will be setup in our billing system and you will receive a client welcome email with your account details. This email will have instructions for paying your account online.
We will need the following information from you:
- Accounts Payable contact with an email address and telephone number
- Main Project Contact, address, email, and telephone number
- Names and email addresses for the IT Contact, Hardware Contact and Financial Contact as outline above.
Communication of Security Information
The IT organization for our clients often have questions about how we handle your data, secure our system and ensure the safety of your data. Please feel free to share the OPS-COM Security White Paper with anyone who requires it.
Utilizing OPS-COM Support
You will be directed to email many things directly to support@ops-com.com over the course of your roll out. You can also launch an support ticket from inside the software at any time if you need help or have questions. Refer to this wiki article for more information about our support team.
Section 3 - Getting Ready to Rollout the System
Setup of OPS-COM Preview and Production Spaces
Production and Preview spaces are generally available to you within 2 weeks of contract sign off. Your OPS-COM domain will be agreed upon during setup. An example of this domain may be yourdomain.ops-com.com. Please note, www. is not required as part of the domain name.
All clients get a testing/preview space as part of their installation. The preview spaces exist to allow clients to test or stage changes to their system. The preview spaces are secured in the same manner as our production/live systems though they exist in a testing environment. As an OperationsCommander client, you can access your preview space by simply adding the "-preview" suffix to your subdomain name. Using the example above your preview space would be
yourdomain-preview.ops-com.com
You will be given the links and login details for both the Preview and Production spaces once they are live. Preview Spaces are denoted with an orange warning banner as seen below in the screenshot.
The Preview spaces are very useful for testing and training. They allow you work with a copy of the live database so that you will have real data to work with without affecting your production system. The database can be manual reset at any time by following the instructions in this wiki article. This will allow you to "erase" your training data and start testing again.
Admin and Client Domains
There are two aspects of the OPS-COM system; the Admin console and the End-User interface. After setup, you will be able to access your OperationsCommander Admin console at yourdomain.ops-com.com/admin and your clients can access OPS-COM at yourdomain.ops-com.com
You will need to reference the End-User interface on your tickets and any communications you have with your clients. This site will be branded as yours with your company logo and colors if you submit them. Please note, www. should not be communicated as part of the domain name.
Determining Access to OPS-COM
There are two components to this process, you must determine your roles and permissions and then you must add Administrators and assign Roles to them.
Determining your Roles and Permissions
OPS-COM allows System Owners and Administrators the ability to setup roles that will restrict access to information and features in OPS-COM. Roles are a group of permissions that are bundled and assigned to a set of users. For example, you may wish to create a role for Patrol Officer. You will set the permissions for this role and assign users the role of Patrol Officer when you would like to grant them permissions that match that job. Users can be assigned multiple roles.
For a quick overview video, CLICK HERE. Refer to this wiki article for more information
Creating Administrator Accounts
When the system is setup for the first time there will only be one Administrator. The OPS-COM team will have set it up and provided the login details to you. To get your other users in the system you will need to follow the steps in this wiki article.
Setting up a Landing Page for your Administrators
When you sign in to OPS-COM initially, you are presented with a landing page. This message is referred to as the Admin Dashboard. This landing page can be modified or edited to allow organizations to display important information to System Administrators and staff.
Initially it is a good place to direct your Admins to the training and support information as you navigate the system. Refer to this wiki article for information about configuring this page. Here are some ideas for what to put on this page once you go live:
- Pricing Information
- Contact Information
- Scheduling Information
- Organizational Information
- Legal Notices
- General Information
Section 4 - Overview of your Business Processes
OPS-COM Wiki and Training
The OperationsCommander parking and security wiki is a growing wealth of information about using our software and how to apply best practices in a busy security office. Before you schedule training, it would be very helpful to review the wiki. To assist with your transition to an improved operational model, or to just see how parking management can be made easy we have organized this WIKI into Training Modules that users can go through at their own pace. The Training Agenda is available here. Contact your Training Coordinator by emailing support@ops-com.com if you have any questions.
Process Information Gathering
After contract sign off, your Account Executive will email you a file with several key questions about your current business processes. You will be asked about your Parking and Enforcement environments, staff levels, user types etc. Any information we know about your setup will already be filled in. The setup call cannot be scheduled until these answers are made available to your Account Executive. An example of the file is attached below. It is called SetupHomework.docx.
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Section 5 - Hosted Payment & Gateway Setup Information
Hosted Payments is the recommended way to handle most of your payments in the OPS-COM system. With Hosted Payments, the payment processor directly handles the payment method details and provides the end result to the client's service implementation. This provides you an additional layer of security because at no time is the credit card information presented to any other system than the payment processor. This also reduces the amount of data being passed from client software to the payment processor, as only the result of the transaction is communicated to client software.
Currently, we have integrated hosted solutions with the following payment providers:
- Paypal
- Moneris
- Chase PaymenTech
- TouchNet
- Bambora
- Authorize.Net
There are wiki articles that explain the details you need to get to us to setup Moneris, Bambora and Authorize.Net linked above. Please supply them in the document below. For Paypal, ChasePaymenTech and Touchnet, you will be contacted by your Project Manager to assist with getting these details. If you are using Text2ParkMe or doing direct billing to Credit Cards you must also supply us with the details required for a gateway setup. Please note, this can take 6 weeks or longer to get all the required information and depends on how responsive your Payment Provider is. This should be started as soon as possible.
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Electronic Funds Transfer Setup
OPS-COM can accept Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT) payments from your clients if you have done the necessary custom development to use this system. Currently, we only offer this service for the Royal Bank of Canada. Contact your Sales Representative if you are using another provider.
EFT is used as a recurring payment method when paying for permits through the rollover process only. EFT cannot be used in any other way in OPS-COM. For more information, refer to this wiki article.
Section 6 - Text2ParkMe Configuration
Text2Park allows users to utilize their personal cellphones SMS functionality to purchase parking in the system without the use of any special app. If you have purchased this module, we must set you up with a telephone number that your user's can text to. Please email support to let them know your preferred area code and location for setup.
Section 7 - Setup of OPS-COM Config and Admin Options
There are many options to be setup before you go live with OPS-COM. Your Account Executive will be coordinating the gathering of the following information. Please fill in the worksheets below and email them to support@ops-com.com
If you have any questions or concerns you can contact your Training Coordinator at any time by emailing support@ops-com.com
Graphics and Images Required
The following information is required to complete your setup. This information will be placed on the End-User portal. Please add the file names to the worksheet below and email the images and the worksheet to support@ops-com.com
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User Setup
Your Account Executive will help you determine what user types may be useful for you to setup and what the rules appropriate to those users may be. For example, you may want to allow Full-Time Students to park in different lots than Part-Time students. User Types will lay the groundwork for you to do this. Once you have decided what types you will be using, you can use this wiki article to set them up.
You will also need to decide what information you will require when a new user creates a profile on your system. Refer to this wiki article for setup information.
You will also need to setup the Vehicle description information and your locations.
ParkAdmin Setup
A powerful aspect of OPS-COM is the ability to setup Virtual Parking lots and segregate them into Lot Groups and Zones. You will also have to give consideration to the types of permits and the rules for each permit type that you would like to use. For example, you may want to allow for permits that are sold daily or monthly.
Your Training Coordinator will discuss this in detail with you. Before discussing it, review the information in this section of the wiki.
ViolationAdmin Setup
ViolationAdmin uses innovative mobile technology to efficiently track, manage and record violations to support your parking environment. To setup this module, you will be required to a number of tasks. These tasks are listed below.
Proof and order your Violations stock
Your Account Executive will be in contact to ensure you are getting the correct tickets and that you approve the design. This can have a long lead time and should be done quickly. If you are sourcing your own Violation stock please ensure you allow yourself 4-6 weeks to have them printed and shipped to you.
Setup your Handhelds and Printers
If you have purchased the hardware through the OPS-COM team, we will ship them directly to you with the software pre-loaded and the printer's paired. If you have sourced them yourself, you will need to follow the instructions in the wiki articles to complete the setup of your Android handheld units. You will also need to use the instructions in the wiki articles below to setup and pair your printers.
- Using your Google Account supplied by OPS-COM
- Setting Up your Handheld Units for the First Time
- Setting your Android for Auto-Updates
- Ticket Creation Settings
- Setting up your Ticket Footer
- Printer Setup
Your Training Coordinator will go through using the handhelds but it is beneficial to work through the Android Handheld Wiki to make the training more meaningful for you. In particular it is important to familiarize your self with the Best Practices for OPS-COM Android wiki article.
Input your Offences
OffenceAdmin allows Administrators to add, remove and edit the offences that are used to issue Violations. Fine amounts are set and the discount for each offence is administered here. You must populate your Ticket Type groups and your corresponding offenses. For information about this refer to this wiki article.
System Messaging Setup
Your Account Executive will guide you through setting up the various system messaging in OPS-COM. For now, download the document below and use the sample information to create your own messaging. If you have the messaging ready it will be a simple cut and paste to update the OPS-COM Message settings.
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Setting up Invoice Templates
OPS-COM will allow you to prepare/send invoices for permit purchases. The Invoicing feature is used to simplify the monthly billing/invoicing process for bulk payment of permit purchases. For more information about setting up your Invoice Template refer to this wiki article.
Section 8 - Data Import
If you have paid for or are being quoted for doing a data import we will work with you to ensure the data is provided to us in a format we can import. An example of the column headers we would expect to see in a .csv file are listed below. Each import is unique and not all data can be imported. This will be assessed with a support representative an a quote will be provided to you before proceeding.
| Company Name | User Name | First Name | Last Name | Email Address | Street Address | City | Province | Postal Code | Phone Number | Plate Number | Permit Number |
Section 9 - Final Preparations before Go Live
Now that the system is setup and you are familiar with OPS-COM, it is important to do a final review of the User Portal to ensure you are happy with the way it is presented to your customers. You can create a test user on the system and login to have a look around and see what the user experience it like. Make sure you are happy with all messaging that is presented to your clients. If you have questions or concerns, take a screenshot and send it to support@ops-com.com.