One of the largest train operating companies (TOCs) in the UK worked with the Information Lab to put their data to work and optimise their existing. The large amount of data quickly overwhelmed them making it necessary to find automated ways to process and visualise their data and capture the workforce’s newfound interest in analytics. By opting for a stack of Alteryx and Tableau to clean, transform and visualise their data they were able to answer many questions ranging from tracking customer satisfaction to ensuring that the availability of trains was optimised to deliver a smoother customer experience.

The Challenge

As companies modernise and make more of an effort to collect data they are met with fresh challenges. From requiring solutions that can process millions of records for analysis, to devising automated solutions that do not require human intervention – it is critical for organisations to re-consider their analytics stack to ensure they are extracting the most value out of their data.

The challenges experienced by modernising a data stack do not simply stop at migrating their work from one software solution to another. A cultural change is also required to ensure that users can comfortably self-serve and answer their own questions. Having so much data at your fingertips can become overwhelming, so ensuring that the solution is as seamless as possible to engage with is a key priority.

Our Solution

The Information Lab helped this TOC successfully automate their key data processes with an analytics stack of Alteryx and Tableau, deploying Alteryx Server in AWS while maintaining access to on-premises data sources. Once the data had been centralised and ready for visualisation the team designed Tableau Workbooks which brought their data to life, allowing them to uncover trends that answered challenging business problems.

To ensure that everyone at the TOC could benefit from the data available The Information Lab carried out extensive training to the workforce, allowing them to connect to published data sources and answer their own questions in real-time.

The Impact

This solution has turned data from being a burden to an asset, with users able to query a single source of truth without having to rely on out-of-date offline flat files.

The modernised data stack has freed teams up to tackle vital problems. By moving to an automated solution, one team has seen 40 additional hours freed up, which was previously spent simply copy and pasting data.

Business critical reporting has been fully automated, saving approximately 4 days per month for each team. The time saved has allowed them to tackle even bigger problems, such as automating a solution which handles £13m worth of rebate revenue yearly.