From the saddle to the sky
Challenges
Thanks to the onset of the digital revolution, bicycle sharing was becoming increasingly popular, and Csepel Zrt. needed a ticket handling system to maintain the logistics and servicing of its bicycles used in the MOL Bubi project.
BIKA vs. Jira
BIKA, used at the time of MOL Bubi 1.0, operated with a weak frontend-backend system that struggled with the rapid changes in demand. The slowness in reacting to changes meant that the company often ran out of time to handle individual error tickets. Although the system did enable filtering and the creation of tables and reports, these could only be managed with a higher level of user knowledge. This meant that a single project could take weeks to implement if the right experts and developers weren’t available.
In contrast, one of the biggest advantages of Jira is its flexibility. Csepel Zrt. could adapt the system to the company's operations without requiring multiple developers. Jira provided an interface where it was possible to easily customize all the settings, such as the time to open an error ticket for a station, or to suspend error tickets for stations that are empty at night. These corrections and calibrations were fully customized by the company with the help of the company's IT department.
Performance indicators and challenges
- Full capacity at stations: Ensuring that bicycles are always available is a significant challenge, given the very high number of rentals. BKK divided the stations into two different groups, which both require constant monitoring. The first group contains premium stations in busier locations. When empty, these stations need to be filled with bicycles within one and a half hours. Standard stations, on the other hand, should be restocked within three hours.
- Rentals: Customers can submit complaints related to rentals at any time. These complaints are sent directly to the system and can be re-categorized within JIRA. Generally, most of the errors are related to the smart locks. With 10,000 daily rentals, there are typically several hundred open complaints, and the operator must resolve them quickly.
- Bicycles: In addition to the stations and rentals, there are also many error tickets related to the bicycles. Most of these are SLA violation error tickets, which compromise the safety of the bike. These are extremely hard to process, as in many cases, the errors are not valid, yet they have to be continuously checked, and the given problem has to be categorized.
Summary
Industry: Transportation
Location: Central-Europe
Requirements:
- Implementation of a central, unified ticketing platform
- Effective SLA management with automatic monitoring
- Easy processing of error tickets and efficient reporting
Implemented product(s):
- Jira Service Management
- META-INF Email This Issue
Solution
Automatic monitoring
The system sends data such as station saturation directly to Jira from Nextbike's software via API, which is tracked by sampling every five minutes. Based on this information, the dispatcher directs the maintenance staff on the road.
MOL Bubi APP
Customers are able to submit error tickets through the app. Jira helps to translate these fault tickets into an interface that the dispatcher can use to direct the maintenance and logistics staff in the field. The ticket management system makes it easy to set up people responsible for a problem, and Jira also keeps track of the task’s progress.
Result
Jira integration from the development side
Jira integration for Csepel Zrt.'s operation was a more complicated and exciting project than implementing a basic Jira Service Management.
Firstly, when processing error reports of incoming error tickets, user-submitted error tickets are sent to Jira by email in the form of a well-structured data, which is then processed by the Email This Issue (JETI) add-on. In addition to Email This Issue, the Jira Automation feature supports more complicated tasks.
Another challenging area is API monitoring, as the Nextbike API is called every five minutes using ScriptRunner Cloud code. The system compares the data stored in Nextbike's API system about the stations and bikes and then checks them for SLA violation tickets within JIRA. Based on these, it automatically creates, updates, and closes error tickets but provides the option of manual overrides on an ongoing basis.
In the case of Csepel Zrt., a further addition was the export of monthly SLA reports. The reports had to be checked for compliance with very specific conditions, which META-INF set using the Xporter add-on. Practically every month, the add-on combines the data of thousands of issues in an Excel function.
During the project, the Jira Automation feature played a major role, including the creation of automated rules, a growing part of which is now written by Csepel Zrt. itself. This is a perfect example of how, after implementation, the customer can either entirely or almost entirely take over the operations, development, and coordination of a system.
About the client
About MOL Bubi
MOL Bubi 1.0 was launched in 2014, with Csepel Zrt. winning the bid for its operations. This was in an entirely new and unfamiliar territory, as it also included building the bike-sharing stations, the first ever in Hungary. The structure of the project was relatively simple, with the German company Nextbike supplying the software, Csepel Zrt. the bicycles and the work related to the roads, and BKK (Budapest Transport Center) as the owner. The MOL Bubi 1.0 system had 2,200 bicycles and 76 stations, growing to 158 with time. Though there were 2-3,000 rentals a day initially, these numbers fell over time. One reason for this was that registering and purchasing tickets or passes was incredibly difficult. The dense tires also meant the bicycles were extremely heavy, which people didn't like. At this time, the company used the BIKA (Bicycle Maintenance) system, which had monitoring and ticketing functions. The biggest problem came when any changes needed to be made, something that occurred on a frequent basis as new needs arose.
In 2020, the company bid farewell to the old, heavy bicycles and released MOL Bubi 2.0. Though responsibility for the operations side was once again awarded to Csepel Zrt., the figures this time changed dramatically. Today, there are a total of 1,200 bikes in the system, with 8-10,000 rentals per day. However, this meant that the system experienced constant pressure, with fewer bicycles and high demand. There are currently around 75,000 registered customers, with about 50,000 active users per month. MOL Bubi uses Jira as a monitoring and ticketing system to manage the supply of road-related tasks.
About the partner
About the product
Jira Service Management
Jira Service Management is Atlassian’s service management solution for all teams. It is designed to help you unlock high-velocity teams by empowering every team to deliver great service fast, bringing visibility to work, and accelerating the flow of work between development, IT, and business teams.
META-INF Email This Issue for Jira
Make your customers' lives easier through email-based communication. Improves the productivity of your help desk team by enabling them to receive and respond to emails without leaving Jira.
Source: From the saddle to the sky…| Magyar Atlassian Meetup #19
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