From Taboo to Trusted: How ClickBeforeYouDig Transformed Damage Prevention

- Mike Sullivan, President, Utility Safety Partners

There was a time when the idea of requesting a utility locate online felt almost reckless. I recall showing my fresh new and rebranded Alberta One-Call Corporation business card to an industry colleague and when he saw the ClickBeforeYouDig brand on the back of the card, he went up one side of me and down the other!

Oh, how times have changed.

When Alberta One-Call Corporation first began shifting the damage prevention process from phone calls to online submissions in 2013, the ClickBeforeYouDig concept was, in many circles, considered taboo. Damage prevention was built on human interaction—call takers asking clarifying questions, operators manually interpreting excavation descriptions, and a belief that voice conversations were safer than keyboards.

Replacing that model with “clicks” raised concerns. Would excavators provide enough detail? Would digital tickets increase errors? Would the system lose the nuance that experienced call centre staff brought to each request?

At the time, the hesitation was understandable. But history has proven something important: without ClickBeforeYouDig, modern damage prevention simply would not exist.

Breaking a Cultural Barrier

Early adoption of online ticketing wasn’t about convenience; it was about cultural change. Alberta One-Call Corporation wasn’t just introducing a new tool—it was challenging decades of process habit.

Moving from calls to clicks meant trusting excavators and contractors to define their work digitally. It meant replacing verbal explanations with mapping tools, standardized forms, and automated validation. It meant letting technology do what people had always done manually. I mean, think about it. Computers fly planes full of people! Online locate requests? Piece of cake!

To some, though, it felt risky. To others, like me, it was inevitable.

What followed was not a loss of quality, but an explosion of capability.

In the 12 years since Alberta One-Call, now Utility Safety Partners, began promoting ClickBeforeYouDig, it has become the digital backbone of the damage prevention process. Once requests lived online, the industry could finally innovate at scale.

Online ticketing enabled a fundamental shift in how information moved through the damage prevention system. Instead of relying on vague verbal descriptions, requests could be built on accurate GIS mapping. Automated validation rules began preventing incomplete or incorrect tickets before they ever reached facility owners. Excavators and utilities gained real-time status tracking, while digital audit trails replaced guesswork during investigations and claims. Systems could integrate directly with asset management platforms, and for the first time, data analytics could be used to identify risk trends and behaviours across the entire process.

The moment tickets became data, the entire ecosystem gained the ability to learn, adapt, and improve.

Streamlining the Entire Process

ClickBeforeYouDig didn’t just improve ticket submission; it streamlined every downstream step.

Facilities received cleaner, more consistent information. Locators could prepare before arriving on site. Excavators gained visibility into completion timelines. Administrators gained reporting tools that replaced manual spreadsheets and after-the-fact reconciliation.

The result was not just faster service—but smarter service.

Reducing Damages and Claims

Perhaps most importantly, ClickBeforeYouDig helped drive measurable safety outcomes.

Better mapping reduced ambiguity. Standardized inputs reduced misunderstanding. Digital records of “I’m digging HERE” reduced disputes when a buried utility was damaged outside of the indicated dig site. And faster communication reduced excavation without locates.

ClickBeforeYouDig didn’t merely digitize the old process—it made the process safer by design.

Today, ClickBeforeYouDig feels obvious, but despite its proven benefits, and 88% of all locate requests in Canada being placed online, ClickBeforeYouDig still isn’t the primary call-to-action for many Notification Centres across North America - and inexplicably, neither the Common Ground Alliance nor Canadian Common Ground Alliance recognize it as a best practice.

Still, the user preference data clearly indicates it’s no longer controversial—it’s foundational. But its real legacy is what it made possible.

Mobile ticketing. GIS overlays. Short-notice processing. Alternate locate providers. Real-time notifications. Performance analytics. Even emerging concepts driven by the ever-present spectre of artificial intelligence all depend on one thing: a digital front door.

Without ClickBeforeYouDig, none of those innovations exist.

What once felt taboo is now a trusted and well-established process within the damage prevention vernacular.

Moving from calls to clicks didn’t just modernize ticket intake—it unlocked an entirely new era of damage prevention. It proved that safety and technology are not opposites; they are partners.

ClickBeforeYouDig wasn’t about changing how people submit tickets. It was about changing what the industry could become.

And without that shift, the damage prevention process would still be waiting on hold.