If you work in law enforcement at the state and local levels, you know the challenges that your department faces: a tighter budget, but demands for equal or higher productivity.
It’s a difficult problem to solve — how are you supposed to do more with less?
An eCitation solution can help solve this critical issue.
What is eCitation?
As defined by the eCitation Coalition, eCitation is “a mobile technology solution that automates the citation process.”
In other words, it’s an automated method of issuing tickets and collecting driver data. The solution consists of a mobile computer, a printer, and software. The combined performance and ruggedness of the mobile computer makes it ideal for daily use in all types of weather and temperatures. The portable printer produces a high-quality ticket at the site of the traffic offense and reduces the amount of time officers spend creating citations. And the software provides reporting features and acts as the backbone for your eCitation system.
What are the benefits?
Even though there is the initial cost of implementing an eCitation solution, it proves a quick ROI through three main benefits:
- Higher organizational efficiency
- Increased revenue
- Improved officer safety
Higher Organizational Efficiency
As you can expect with any automated solution, efficiency will increase exponentially. Employees using automated technology — in this case, officers using mobile computers and printers — see considerable increases in their output.
Law enforcement and other government personnel can now spend considerably less time on manual data entry, which frees up time for other tasks. Police officers can use that time to monitor more traffic (and maybe issue a few more citations), while office staff can focus on other responsibilities that keep state and local governments running.
Additionally, many eCitation solutions can work within your existing technology infrastructure, so you won’t need to overhaul your current system.
Increased Revenue
Because law enforcement personnel are using an electronic system, paperwork and paper waste is reduced, which saves money. And when budgets get cut, any reduction in spending counts.
Moreover, the fact that eCitation saves time and allows officers to issue more tickets more accurately means that state and local governments will gain more revenue. As the number of accurate tickets increases, the amount of revenue will also. This goes hand-in-hand with another issue: accuracy.
Eliminating manual data entry also eliminates chances for manual error. Without an eCitation solution, there is a chance for human error from the initial citation issue to the moment the citation is entered into the city’s database. Manual error leads to dismissed tickets — and every dismissed ticket is a waste of time and money. What’s the use of issuing more citations if you can’t enforce any of them? There isn’t one.
Improved Officer Safety
Because eCitation reduces the amount of time officers spend issuing individual tickets, it also reduces the amount of time they spend outside of their vehicles on the side of the road. Each ticketed offense puts law enforcement personnel at risk of being hit by passing cars, or possible exposure to dangerous law violators.
Lowry Solutions is a member of the eCitation Coalition and an expert on automatic data capture technology. Contact us today to see how we can help you implement or maintain an eCitation solution.
