About ASL Limited's 'How' and what makes us different

ASL Limited, as a drainage company, is well-established in the industry. It has motivated and innovative people at its heart, creating solutions to help our clients and customers. You may think it is difficult to get motivated about dealing with drains; however, it is quite an exciting experience when we develop a solution to our clients' problems, which seemed impossible to solve. All four of our departments above are headed up by fully trained, qualified managers. All our engineers are also fully trained and qualified in their particular fields, within different but inter-linked departments of our company. All our staff has a basic knowledge of all the areas that we work in, e.g. a blocked drains operative will have an overview and experience of private sewage systems, and how they work, because they communicate and work together across departments regularly to assist one another. We will always send the specialist in the particular department to come to our customers’ aid, but he may well pull in other staff members to assist with associated work.

The best examples of this are our ‘blocked drain engineers’. When they help with the installation of septic tanks and treatment plants, you can imagine they gain a lot of experience to help our customers. When one of our engineers responds to unblock a customer’s drain, he can call on his basic knowledge gained while working on main public sewers and private sewage systems.  He can recognise and advise the customer when: it’s not a blocked drain, but in fact, their pumping station has broken down; or their treatment plant is not discharging properly because of a pump malfunction, or the main public sewer is blocked. He also knows just who to call to solve the problem, whether it is the local authorities or an appropriate colleague within a department of ASL Limited.

Another example is when one of our ‘blocked drain engineers’ comes across a septic tank with a small pump after it or a treatment plant with electrical working parts – he has enough knowledge to recognise the problem. He is well aware that he is not an electrician and he is not allowed to touch the electric system, but again he has got the right ASL Limited electrical engineer on speed dial and knows him personally. He also understands if the ASL Limited tanker is needed to suck the sewage out of the drains and out of the private sewage system with his basic experience.

I think you get the idea – all of our experts in the company, in all departments, have a basic understanding of what is required in each other’s departments, are familiar with and can immediately call on the right professional best suited to that particular job.

Because ASL Limited is a small to medium-sized company, we cannot only carry out a simple blocked drain job, but we can also take on contracts for £10,000 to £100,000. One of the benefits of having four specialist departments means we are equipped for a full range of drainage services. For example, we have several different jetting machines with unique abilities, pressures, and flows suitable for various tasks instead of ‘one fits all’. This is also true of our vehicles, tools, and equipment, enabling us to send the right combination for every sized application. 

Our dedicated team delivers thousands of solutions for new customers per year, leading to long-term maintenance packages and forming solid working relationships with happy customers. In the office, we work tirelessly throughout going the extra mile, tailoring our services to you – our client – creating a natural desire to return and share your positive experience of our company, which results in the strengthening of our brand.

Our core brand values aim to ensure all of our jobs leave a lasting impression for all the right reasons. Our approach is to listen to your requirements; deliver our service on time; within agreed budgets; and to a standard that will exceed your expectations.

We believe that for our personnel to invest their passion and dedication in our company, we need to invest in them. ASL creates opportunities and experiences through communicated plans. We stay connected with our teams through regular catch-ups, engage our people in change, create incentives for performance and reward results with recognition schemes, company fun days and team building days.

1. Customer service: We will love the way customers treat us when we are friendly, knowledgeable and quick to respond. We are there to take care of our customer’s challenges, and in turn, they will take care of us with mutual respect and by doing business with us over and over again.
2. Our culture: Is the kind of organization we want to be. After all, you love your jobs; our values are congruent with our customers; to do an excellent job, tell the truth and manage realistic expectations.
3. Our Cause: We believe in what they believe in, we can meet what they expect from us, through our training and our motivational meetings every morning (before Covid).
4. Trust: Trust each other. Carry out our work as per the estimate, but if adjustments are required, make sure the customer is well informed and part of that decision. If customers find it difficult to trust our organization, they may not ask us to do business with them again in the future.
5. Reputation: Is the result of our training and feedback. Mistakes are not the ruination of our reputation, but how we handle them could be. We must learn from our mistakes and make sure we don’t make the same ones repeatedly. This protects our reputation, and this mindset is a big influence on the decisions we make.
6. Consistency: Cement our reputation. Are we always early to arrive on the job, or are we always late? Are we always finished on time, or are we always over time? How do we want our customers to use the word ‘always’ to describe their experience of us? For example: “ASL are always friendly and knowledgeable”, “ASL always helps me to make an informed decision” or “they are always so helpful”.
7. The How: The way we do business: This is about our process, policies, the hours we are truthfully open, our location, being clear and transparent and more. It is really about our operation. The clarity, truth and consistency will get a customer in the door and combining this with our principles and brand values will bring them back year after year.
8. The Why: As with Simon Sinek’s quotes and speeches. My understanding of all of these values above (and more) may contribute to why a customer chooses our company over another. When we figure out a customer’s “Why” we strive to meet our customers' goals and needs, we will most certainly connect and bring customers back, again and again; giving us the security and opportunities to grow; resilience takes practice.