Equity Residential Documents $250,000 Savings in EnergyCAP’s Issue Tracker

“Thanks to EnergyCAP, we have already identified savings of $250,000 in 2009 alone,” says Lou Schotsky, Vice President of Property Operations for Equity Residential (EQR).

Accounting staff and property management administration at EQR, the largest publicly traded owner, operator, and developer of multifamily housing in the United States, are using the Issue Tracker functionality in EnergyCAP to help track and report on one-time and recurring energy-related issues that lead to bottom line savings.

Issue Tracker is a “trouble ticket” system for utility bills. Once EnergyCAP’s audits spot a cost anomaly or savings opportunity, an Issue is created. Each Issue includes optional data fields designed for tracking of cost and usage reduction estimates. Schotsky is using those fields to tally recurring and one-time expense recoveries. “We’ve always tried to track savings related to energy audits and analysis, but now that everything is in EnergyCAP the issues are easier to find, fix and track. We’ve been pleasantly surprised to see how big the numbers are when you add them up.”

Schotsky says that the recurring issues primarily involve rate analysis, while the one-time issues are most often billing errors.