Field Workers Can't Afford to Lose Critical Information

July 2, 2025

When Data Loss Becomes a Public Safety Crisis

Why Field Workers Can’t Afford to Lose Critical Information.

Last month, a major utility’s field crew discovered critical corrosion on a transformer serving 15,000 customers during a routine inspection. The technician documented everything—thermal readings, oil analysis results, photos of damaged components, and recommended immediate replacement.

The field workers think their data synced but it isn’t until weeks later that they realize the data never made it to Maximo; the data was lost.

Without that documentation, the transformer wasn’t flagged for emergency replacement. Three weeks later, it failed during peak summer demand, leaving an entire neighborhood without power for 16 hours—including a hospital running on backup generators.

This isn’t just about inconvenience. It’s about public safety and critical infrastructure.

In Electrical Utilities: Missing substation inspection records, pole condition assessments, or equipment maintenance logs can lead to:

Preventable outages affecting thousands
Regulatory violations and massive fines
Worker safety incidents from uninspected equipment
Public safety risks from infrastructure failures

🔧 The Real Cost:

Average utility outage: $150 per customer per hour
Emergency equipment replacement: 300% higher cost than planned maintenance
Regulatory fines: Up to $1M+ for incomplete safety documentation
Legal liability: Immeasurable when public safety is compromised

Field Workers Need Bulletproof Systems: ✅ Offline data capture with sync when connected ✅ Two-Phase Sync with the 1st stage to device DB so that data is never lost ✅ Automatic exponential backoff retries for maximal resilience during network instability ✅ Structured multi-transport logging to flag records or files that need a closer look ✅ Direct communication from device when data errors can’t be resolved

How does your organization ensure field inspection data never disappears?