Daily occurrence book business case: How to write yours

Daily occurrence book business case: How to write your proposal to get investment.

Paper daily occurrence books are a thing of the past. You know this. However, you also know to invest in an alternative you need a business case. Writing a security business case is a pain unless you have help…

Digital Daily occurrence book business case: How to write yours

Below is a super powerful daily occurrence book business case. Within the [brackets] you find a comment. This indicates what should be added in each section of the security business case.

This is a security business case for the digital daily occurrence book. But use the same format for any business case.

Daily occurrence book business case: Executive summary

[Write a few lines describing the proposed option chosen and why.]

We currently ask our employees at site to use paper books to log day-to-day activity. These books are called daily occurrence books and they are used at 40 sites.

We propose replacing these paper books with a digital alternative produced by SIRV.

We recommend SIRV because their digital occurrence book will enhance our reputation and reduce environmental and financial costs. Moreover, the product is:

• Innovative: Recognized by awards.
• Reliable: 99.99% uptime.
• Safe: Many peers have used it for the last 8 years.

Reasons to switch to a digital daily occurrence book

[Add to the security business case three problems, challenges or pains caused by the current way of doing things.]

We need to move to the SIRV digital daily occurrence book because:

1. Access

The only way to view a paper book is to visit site or ask a local user to send an image of the book. Also, once the book has been used it is placed in storage, making it inaccessible. Therefore, viewing an occurrence book is time consuming.

In the event an entry is incorrectly catalogued it can take one person days to search through archived books.

2. Legibility

Because many users handwriting is poor, entries are often illegible which means it’s:

• Not fit to pass on to the client and reflects badly on the company.
• Inadmissible as evidence in court proceedings.

3. Paper cost

Paper books have an environmental and financial cost.

Transporting paper books to site and then placing them in storage is costly and time consuming. Also, carbon copy books use carbon sheets which are harmful for the environment. Therefore, paper books do not comply with the company’s environmental policy.

4. Threat integrations

The SIRV solution integrates with its Threat AI. As a result, the book will display notifications, such as protests in London.

Daily occurrence book: Business options

[List the security business case options.]

We have three options:

1. Do nothing: Continue to have the same problems as outlined above. However, this puts us at a competitive disadvantage.
2. Invest in the SIRV digital daily occurrence book: This gives us a competitive advantage.
3. Self-deliver. Assign responsibility for the solution to our IT team.

Business case digital daily occurrence book: Benefits

[Explain and quantify the three benefits of the change.]

1. Competitive benefit

Many competitors continue to use paper books. In comparison, the SIRV digital daily occurrence book is innovative and environmentally friendly. Therefore, if a prospective client wants to distinguish between suppliers, a digital occurrence book may be sufficient grounds for contract award.

We estimate the profit made from new business wins range in value from £10,000 to £100,000 per annum. The digital occurrence book will be responsible for one contract award per annum. Therefore, we prudently value the introduction of the digital occurrence book as £10,000 profit per year.

2. Benefit of removing paper

We assume one paper book costs £2 and is used every month. Therefore, over a year the cost of a paper book is 12 x £2 = £24 per annum.

Distribution cost is calculated as the average journey time to distribute and collect books by a supervisor.  This is 1 hour. The hourly supervisor pay rate is £15 per hour and one book is delivered and returned per month. Therefore, the cost of distribution and collection is 12 x  £15 per month = £180 per annum.

However, the supervisor will perform other tasks beside book distribution. Therefore, assume only 10% of their time is spent on this activity. As a result, the distribution cost is £18 per annum.

In summary, the purchase and distribution cost of a paper occurrence book is: £18 + £24 = £42 per annum.

3. Benefit to our reputation

Paper occurrence books can lead to reputational harm and the loss of business. Because paper occurrence books are:

• Lost
• Illegible

Therefore, damage is done to the company’s reputation.

As a result, we estimate one contract will be lost every five years. Therefore, our prudent loss of business estimate is £10,000 every five years or £2,000 per annum.

In summary, the benefit of a digital book is:

• More competitive: £10,000 per annum
• Paper removal: 40 sites x £42 per annum = £1,680 per annum
• Reputation enhancement: £2,000 per annum

Therefore, to deploy the digital occurrence book to 40 sites gives the total benefit of £13,680 per annum.

Expected dis-benefits

[Include in the security business case any negative outcomes from the business change.]

The expected dis-benefit of introducing the SIRV occurrence book is the reliance it places on the internet. Because not all sites can access the internet we expect some sites to continue to need paper occurrence books. However, these sites are remote and represent less than 5% of all our sites.

If hardware is required to access the digital occurrence book we estimate this will cost £100 per site. This is the price of a used Chromebook or new tablet.

Both these devices will use free local Wi-Fi on site.

Timescale

[How quickly is the solution deployed.]

This daily occurrence book business case commits to the following timelines:

1. The product is Software as a Service. Therefore, there is no installation time.
2. Training is less than two hours.
3. From installation full adoption of the occurrence book will take one month.

One month after the installation of SIRV we expect paper books to no longer be used.

Cost

[Calculate the cost of the solution for a year].

One SIRV digital occurrence book costs [£8] per month. Deployed to 40 sites the cost will be 40 x £8 = £320 per month or £3,840 per annum.

Major risks

[List the major risks of the change]

The two major risks are loss of:

• Service owing to internet outage.
• Data owing to the failure of SIRV.

These risks are reduced because:

• The SIRV mobile app does not need internet access to post entries, it continues to works offline.
• The occurrence book is backed-up by SIRV every 24 hours. In addition, we can back-up our occurrence books locally.

Investment appraisal

[Make clear your security business case is financially viable. List the financial cost and benefit over the next three years. The net benefit is the benefit less cost].

The Daily occurrence book business case investment appraisal is as follows:

Financial cost

Assume we deploy the SIRV digital occurrence book to 40 sites. Therefore, 40 sites x £8 per site per is £320 per month or £3,840 per annum.

Financial Benefit

• Remove the cost of book delivery and collection. This saves us 40 sites x £42 = £1,680 per annum.
• One new site is won every year because of the digital occurrence book. Therefore, the additional profit is £10,000 per annum.
• We avoid reputational damage. Therefore, one contract every five years is saved, this represents a saving of £2,000 per annum.

Therefore, the financial benefit is (£1,680 + £10,000 + £2,000) £13,680 per annum.

Security business case conclusion

[Brief statement confirming the security business case recommendation.]

In conclusion, this daily occurrence book business case clearly shows the SIRV solution is a benefit and financially viable.

(If you need even more reasons to ditch the paper occurrence book, here’s 11 more).