On Demand CRM Platform From Relationals Helped Thousands Find New Homes After Hurricane Katrina

Automated “matchmaking” platform helps relief organizations match available homes with victims.

San Jose, Calif., (PRWEB) December 31, 2005 -- Typically, Relationals’ on-demand platform and CRM application helps major media organizations, including Gannett, Scripps, Knight-Ridder, and McClatchy, among others, manage their sales and marketing functions. But after Hurricane Katrina, the customizable platform was put to a more philanthropic use – finding homes for those displaced by Hurricane Katrina.

Organizations like the Foundation of Hope, in conjunction with the Red Cross and FEMA, have been using Relationals as an automated “matchmaking” platform to link victims with available homes. To date, thousands are using the service and almost 200 families have been placed in new homes throughout the United States.

“In the past, finding homes for victims of natural disasters was a difficult process,” said Greg Buckingham, a member of the Board of Directors for the Foundation of Hope, a non-profit organization based in Aliso Viejo, California. “With Relationals, we were able to get up and running in one day – and our network of helpers across the United States were able to input available homes and victims into the system immediately. To date, thousands are using the system in an ongoing effort to help those who lost everything in this horrific disaster.”

“The team wanted to find some way to help the people who were helping the victims of Hurricane Katrina,” said Pankaj Malviya, chief executive officer for Relationals. “Understanding the power and flexibility of our On-Demand platform and our CRM solution to track processes, people, resources, reporting and more, we knew we could put a disaster management solution in place quickly. By working closely with the Foundation of Hope, we were able to streamline and accelerate the process of matching those who needed assistance with those who could provide that help. It’s terrific when enterprise application software can be leveraged to help people hit so hard by a disaster. It makes such a huge difference in people’s lives.”

Intake Shifts from Days to Hours
Buckingham noted that prior to Katrina, matching victims of natural disasters to new homes was a manual process that took a lot of time and effort.

“Prior to Katrina, we were taking in maybe eight families every six weeks. We used a paper processing system that was manageable at that time,” he said. “However, once Katrina hit, we saw 100 intake families in a day. Paper processing just doesn’t work, particularly when you’re working in an environment that’s in chaos. The Cajun area was pretty out of control. Families didn’t know where other family members were. They didn’t know what had happened to their homes. And they didn’t know where they were going to get money to even survive. We quickly realized that without a new system of case management, we just weren’t going to make change happen.”

Automating the case management process was imperative for the organization. Particularly since the case management process isn’t as simple as it appears.

“Intake is step one. Step two is a background check and during the process, clients are approved or rejected as candidates for new homes,” said Buckingham. “During step three, a case is set up and assigned to a church sponsor. Step four involves matching families with six or seven home choices. In step five, transportation is arranged and families are made ready to go to their new homes. In the final step, we track and follow the family in the system. Over the next 30, 60 and 90 days, we follow up and make sure that everything is working out for the family in their new community.”

Coming on board during the second week of the disaster, Relationals was put into place by the Foundation for Hope and approved for use by the Red Cross and FEMA to manage the thousands who needed assistance. Relationals automated those steps and simplified the process by taking the information from the church sponsors (who signed up on the Foundation for Hope website) and cross referencing and matching available homes with people on the evacuee lists in the disaster area.

“We wouldn’t have processed 20% of the families that we did without Relationals,” Buckingham said. “We had volunteers coming in for four to seven days to help – and then leaving. With Relationals, we could train people – many with little or no computer ability – and have them up and running processing families in 30 minutes. Once we had a web connection, we could set up anywhere in the affected area and track evacuees throughout the entire process. It was really cool.”

Lack of computer skills didn’t keep volunteers from using the system, Buckingham noted.

“Frankly, I’m not a computer guy at all. So I was amazed. The Relationals team did some quick programming, opened up some new fields and we were up and running. We didn’t have any glitches.”

Buckingham estimates that the Foundation for Hope took in close to a thousand people. Churches across the United States signed up on the website when they had available homes – and that information was automatically transferred into the Relationals database and matched to appropriate families. Through the system, more than 600 people – approximately 200 families – in homes across the United States – from Tennessee to California. Ninety percent of those people have found jobs in their new communities.

“We actually had processed one family and moved them to Seattle in eight hours,” Buckingham said. “Today, we’re still doing placement in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The real challenge at this point is volunteers. We’re heading into the holidays and we need more volunteers to do intake and case management onsite.”

“We’ve offered FEMA this solution as a resource tool on a long-term basis, and it has proven its worth,” Buckingham said. “In future disasters, we expect that Relationals will not only help us find homes for families, but will help us link victims with family members throughout the country and find jobs in other communities.

About Relationals, Inc.
Relationals is a recognized leader in on demand CRM solutions for sales, marketing and customer service. Relationals Customer Relationship Management (CRM) solutions, products and services strengthen customer relationships, improve customer satisfaction and reduce costs by streamlining the process of attracting, retaining, and servicing customers. Relationals is the most easy-to-use, feature-rich and cost effective CRM solution in the market. Relationals customers include newspapers from E.W. Scripps, Knight Ridder, Lee Publications, McClatchy, Hearst Communications and ANG Newspapers. For more information, call 1- 408-364-2430 or visit the Relationals website at http://www.relationals.com.

Relationals are trademarks of Relationals, Inc. All others are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.

# # #