Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis 1. 0 Definition, Investigation and Analysis 1. 1 Definition- Nature of the problem 1. 1. 1 Description of the organisation Cars 4 U Ltd is a car rental company situated in the city of Port Louis. The company rents cars to Mauritians as well as tourists visiting our island. Four years ago …………………. With the rapid expansion of the business, ……………….. The company employs in all 20 employees. Workers involved at the top level of the system: ? ? Mr. Lam Chong who is the managing director and he supervises every transaction f the company. Miss Amy who is the receptionist and also deals with the clients. The manager of the company, Mr. Lam Chong thinks that the present situation of the company will affect its reputation via a subsequent decrease in its number of present and potential customers. Therefore, he has decided to look for an alternative system allowing the efficient running of his company. For this, an investigation of the current system is necessary. 1 Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis 1. 1. Description of how the system functions and methods currently used The system uses a client and a car book to keep details about clients and cars respectively. The CLIENT Book keeps information such as name, surname, client id number, ……. The CAR Book has information on all cars owned by the company. Information such as colour, model, ………….. Operations performed in the CLIENT Book are: ? ? ? ? Addition of a new client Deletion of an existing client Modification of an existing client Looking for information about an existing client

Operations performed in the CAR Book are: ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Addition of a new car Deletion of an existing car Modification of an existing car Looking for information about an existing car Reservation of car Rental of car Return of car 2 Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis The reservation process: ……………… The rental process is carried out in the same manner. 3 Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis 1. 1. 3 Origins of data in current system The following table shows the source of the information stored.

Type of data Client name Client address Client license number Sex Client telephone number Client date of birth Car id Car model Car colour Car capacity Cost price Rental price per day Car status Date of rental Date of reservation Date of return Comes from Client book Client book Client book Client book Client book Client book Car book Car book Car book Car book Car book Car book Car book Car book Car book Car book Format Text Text Text Text Number Date Text Text Text Number Number Number Text Date Date Date Table 1: Origins of data in current system Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis 1. 1. 4 Data flow in current system Adding a new client: Figure 1: Adding a new client Reservation process: …………………………………………………….. Figure 2: Reserving a car Returning a car: …………………………………………………….. Figure 3: Reserving a car Note: The diagram for the rental process is the same as that for reservation. The car status is changed to ‘rented’ in this transaction. 5 Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis 1. 2 Investigation and Analysis 1. 2. Analysis of current system So far, I have come to the conclusion that: ? The time taken by the administrative tasks is enormous; when new customers come to rent vehicles or reserve cars, valuable time is lost due to the manual filling and searching of documents. ? ………………………. 6 Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis 1. 2. 2 Methods of fact-finding 1. 2. 2. 1 Studying existing document An excerpt page of the Car Book: Figure 4: Car Book An excerpt of the Client Book: …………………………………………… Figure 5: Client Book 7

Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis 1. 2. 2. 2 Interview Further investigation of the system was made through interviews with Mr. Lam Chong– the officer in charge of the overall running of the Head Office and consequently of the whole company, and Miss Amy – the receptionist at the Head Office. The interviews were carried out directly with the persons concerned. The questions were such so as to understand the system’s procedures. Questions that were prepared prior to the interviews and transcripts of the interviews are given below: Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis 1. 2. 2. 2. 1 Transcript of interview with Mr. Lam Chong: 1. Good morning Mr. Chong. What are the formalities involved before customer can rent a vehicle? Good morning. Well, there are presently two ways by which a customer can rent a vehicle: Firstly, he can make a reservation before coming to take the car. To make a reservation the customer has to pay a deposit. This all depends on him and the particular model of vehicle the latter wants.

The person must also agree to the conditions specified in the form. Then the vehicle will be booked for him. He will have to come and take it on the day for which he made the booking. The second type of rental is that a customer comes to us directly without any prior contact and chooses a car from the ones that are available at the company at the time he comes. 9 Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis 1. 2. 2. 2. 2 Transcript of interview with Miss Amy: 1. What are your tasks as receptionist?

Most of the time, I answer calls from the customers and receive faxes from the different travel agencies. Then according to the customer’s needs and wants, I make the reservations. 10 Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis 1. 2. 3 Evaluation of the existing problems All the data collected have been analysed. Existing problems are as follows: 1. Lots of wastage and paperwork (Reduced efficiency) In the CLIENT book the number of pages allocated to the surname of a client is predefined. It may happen that for one letter all the allocated pages are used up.

Due to this another book of the same thickness has to be purchased whereby the pages are allocated to different letters. However, the book is utilized only for that particular letter whose allocated pages have been used up. If the pages in even this book are used up, this process has to be repeated again. Most often the rest of the book remains empty and precious storage space is wasted. 2. Time consuming 3. Security 4. Boring, repetitive and tiresome task 5. Modification of data is untidy 6. Data redundancy 11 Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis 1. . 4 Requirements specification Based on these problems and after several discussions concerning the current system, a list of tasks that the new system must be able to do has been established. The list of requirements is as follows: 1 2 3 4 5 Requirement: Store car records in a database Requirement: Store client records in a database Requirement: Modifying and deleting a record should be an easy task Requirement: Searching a particular record in less than a few seconds Requirement: Form based so that it is easy to navigate through ………………………. Table 2: Requirements specification

The lists to be produced are as follows: ? ? ? ? List of currently free cars List of currently reserved cars List of currently rented cars ………………………. 12 Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis 1. 2. 5 Alternative approaches Solution 1: Employing more workers More workers will be employed. ……………………….. Advantages: 1. The workload of the workers will be reduced. Tasks will be distributed among workers. 2. The worker will specialize in the task given to him and become an expert in it. This will increase efficiency and productivity will be higher.

Disadvantages: 1. This system will prove to be expensive and costly in the long run as more salaries will have to be paid and room will have to be made to accommodate for the new workers. 2. If someone fails to come to work, the others will have to carry out the tasks performed by the person. They will not have much knowledge on how to carry out the task and may thus commit lots of errors. It will take time to adjust to the new system. 13 Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis Solution 2: Using a card system ……………………… Advantages: Disadvantages: 14

Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis Solution 3: Computerize the system Advantages: Disadvantages: 15 Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis 1. 2. 6 Selected approach After thorough evaluation of the system, we have come to the conclusion that computerizing the system will be the most effective solution. 1. 2. 6. 1 Software specifications 16 Computerisation of Cars 4 U Ltd-Definition, Investigation and Analysis 1. 2. 6. 2 Hardware specifications Hardware 17” Monitor Justification To see data being input to the system Table 3: Hardware specifications 17