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A new way of working: fixing gates every day to make customers happy

“I’m very proud that I don’t get a lot of callbacks, I’m able to fix things a lot of the time the first time. And I’m proud of watching people that I’ve trained grown in the company and you know, do good. I’m proud of just wearing the APS uniform, it’s a good company and has a lot of special meaning.”

Jake Parli has been a service tech with Access Professional Systems (APS) for over three years and works across San Diego and Orange County. APS installs, designers, and integrates security and access automation solutions, and offer services including quarterly maintenance, repairs, and emergency service. Jake works on routine and emergency service call outs. For him, the job is about safety on all fronts. Both protecting people within the gates and protecting people from the gates.

“My role in safety is to secure properties and make sure that the gates are working properly and safely. That includes the gates being up to the safety codes and making sure even when they’re working properly they don’t injure anybody by getting them trapped in it or closing on cars or anything like that.”

He knows what he is doing. He has taken several thousand service calls. “I mean for this company alone, three years, 5 days a week, doing 6+ calls plus weekend and overtime calls, that’s thousands of calls that I’ve done.”

Getting creative with fixing customer problems

“There’s been a few times where I go out on emergency calls and I have to do some customizing, I have to get a little creative to get things working. It’s always nice when the customer shows and realizes that you’re doing whatever you can for them and they appreciate it, you get them going and to see the smile on their face is cool.”

Jake can turn his hand to all kinds of problems. “I’ve helped with everything from gates stuck open, to gates to stuck closed, gates squeaking, and the gate randomly doing this or that. Anything that makes the customer unhappy, I figure out and try to rectify it so that they’re happy and everything is running smoothly.”

Experience and knowledge makes a big difference

“I’ve been doing this type of work for almost 10 years, it’s just a matter of tracing things out and figuring out where the issue lies. You know, where the power stops, where safety kicks on, where the squeaks are coming from. A lot of it its experience but a lot of it is from diagnosing and then there’s a little bit of luck in there too.”

For Jake, it is more than just a day job. His family likes that he is doing something he enjoys. “They keep asking me to put a gate in at their house. My mom really, really wants a gate. She’s tired of getting out manually opening the gate at her house in the morning. They live up in the mountains, so it’s cold in the morning, she leaves at around 4 for work.”

How APS is different

Working for APS, Jake has seen a lot of firsts. “At the Christmas party, the owner of the company, Russ, came up to me and thanked me for my work and told me that I was doing a good job and that was the first time I ever had a boss actually tell me that.

“We did a company trip to a Charger game, and they did a whole tailgating thing for us. And it was one of the last Charger games in San Diego, so that was really cool. I’ve never experienced anything like that before.

“I’ve never had Christmas bonus before working here. I’ve never had a Christmas party before working here. They’ve taken us out to breakfast a bunch of times.”

APS knows the importance of its employees and clients. As Jake says, “They do a lot of things to give back to their employees.”

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