The Field Service Management best practices in the industry are not quite the same as it was before! Many businesses are replacing the traditional manual process with an effective field service management software solution.
However, to keep up with the competitive market. There are challenges and trends in the industry that business owners need to adopt and apply. Some of these are the best practices that can uplift the growth of the business.
Simply put, they need a strategy that can help Field Technicians and Suppliers to provide a much better service to their customers.
So, if you are already reshaping the Field Service industry with your service quality, then it is high time you can start by investing in an FSM software solution that fulfils your business requirements.
If your focus is to expand your services and grow in the service industry with the best practices, then this article is exactly what you need!
Here are the top 6 Field Service Management best practices every Field Service business owner must focus on when investing or switching to Field Service Software.
- Being Mobile
- Providing information with Real-Time Updates
- Investing in an efficient Scheduling and Dispatching Software Solution
- Generating Invoices Quickly
- Improving Customer Service & Support
- Empowering the Business with Integrations
Mobility as a Field Service Management Best Practices
During the covid outbreak, many industries including the Field Service Management sector experienced huge changes in how they delivered their services.
The impact changed the dynamics of the field service workforce. Many technicians and suppliers who once possessed desk jobs have now opted for modern solutions that will allow them to work from anywhere at any time.
Like any other business, the modern Field Service Business owners started adapting to a much better-organised system in their business, that will support the many roles they play to keep the business afloat.
This is one reason why focusing on improving the mobility aspect of the business is so important. It is considered one of the Field Service Management best practices for trade businesses.
Improving Mobility and investing in mobile-first technology will be a competitive advantage for business owners. According to the report by Markets and Markets, a survey by Copperberg mentions that 35% of businesses solely invested in remote support technology when COVID-19 hit the industry.
Field Services – the term itself highlights the importance of mobility in the job. Equipping technicians with FSM software that provides mobility will increase productivity, and efficiency, improve communication and streamline many administrative tasks within the organisation.
Some of the tasks Field Service Businesses can easily do with FSM software that focuses on mobility features are
- Organising and updating customers, employees and other information in a centralised mobile app.
- Creating Job Requests from anywhere.
- Assigning the right Field Technicians to the right job.
- Scheduling and dispatching technicians on time.
- Sending quotations to customers and other service suppliers.
- Creating and submitting invoices after job completion.
- Maintaining business cash flow.
- Creating budgets.
- Getting paid on time.
Providing information with Real-Time Updates
Real-time updates or Real-time information is one of the many powerful features that came about with the emerging trends in Field Service software technology. As a business following some of the Field Service Management best practices in the industry, it is important that you invest in solutions that provide real-time updates for your technicians on the move.
An FSM software solution with real-time updates is much prefered to any on-demand solution.
Using a software solution with real-time features can benefit you and your business in many ways. Here are some benefits that you can get:
- Improving communication between Field Service suppliers (technicians) and (Property Occupants) customers.
- Getting accurate information on the go.
- Tracking technician progress in the job.
- Quick decision-making using business intelligence.
Investing in an efficient Scheduling and Dispatching Software Solution
Field service businesses are constantly focusing on improving customer experience and customer services to increase profits and get more leads.
Scheduling and dispatching are one of the most important things that affect service quality. Without good scheduling and dispatching software solutions, you are most likely to disappoint many customers.
Missing job appointments, delaying repair, and lack of uncertainty can make your business unreliable. Especially so when you are a business with multiple employees. Organising your workforce and dispatching them at the right time can be tough without the right system in place.
Here are the benefits of investing in efficient scheduling and dispatching software solutions as part of the Field Service Management best practices
- Increased customer satisfaction.
- Organised workforce.
- Increased profitability.
- Reduced miscommunication between teams.
- Lower administrative costs.
- Exceptional planning with real-time updates.
Generating Invoices Quickly
Operating and managing a business comes with a lot of responsibility. From receiving the job request from a property occupant (customer) to dispatching the technicians and completing the job, the process needs to be excellently delivered to achieve customer satisfaction.
There is also one more thing that the business owner must do than only focus on the 5-star rating he/she will be receiving from the customer. That is, sending out invoices as soon as the job is completed.
The main purpose of an invoice is to record the transaction that was made, and most importantly to get paid on time.
Most of the time, many field workers complete several jobs for on-account clients and forget to send them invoices. This, as a result, will create blocks when tallying the books, paying taxes and delaying paying the employees.
This is considered a bad practice, which is why investing in FSM software that helps business owners instantly generate invoices will help them get paid on time!
Software solutions like the i4T Business platforms provide templates for suppliers to easily create invoices and send them to the customers on the move!
Investing in the right software that ticks off every Field Service Management best practices checklist come with many benefits.
Some of the benefits of investing in effective software that generates invoices quickly include:
- Getting paid faster
- Organising financial records to track sales.
- Eliminating billing problems
Improving Customer Service & Support
Meeting customer expectations can be the greatest challenge when providing a service or selling a product. Not all of your customers are going to leave a great review back. However, with your exceptional service and practices, you can gain many loyal customers for your business.
Customer service and support play a major role in businesses’ increasing growth. However, according to a survey conducted during the COVID times, 75% of customers were uncomfortable with technicians coming into their homes. 45% of customers would only have outdoor visits and 20% would completely avoid the visit if possible.
So instances such as these, businesses find it challenging to provide the best services to their customers. Therefore, investing in Field Service Software can help businesses to avoid unnecessary visits to customers’ homes.
With the right tools and resources, technicians can operate in an effective way. Some of the benefits include
- Increased customer loyalty
- Eliminating the barriers to delivering services
- Empowering the team
Empowering the Business with Integrations
Lastly, one of the best practices that business owners can follow when investing in FSM software is to check if the software solution offers several integrations.
A field technician needs his tools both on the field and off. Many technicians who are walking down the digital transformation path often find it difficult to adapt to innovations and new systems.
This is exactly why finding the FSM solutions that strengthen you and your business with all the tools will make the switch easier.
As a sole technician if you are using one of the best accounting or invoicing software you can simply integrate it with your FSM solution. Then you can continue to operate without any hurdles.
This is one of the many reasons why i4T Business is a better choice for Field Service Suppliers in the industry. Whether you are using QuickBooks, XERO or any other software, easily connect with the solution to operate smoothly.
The benefits you get by using software that allows integrations are:
- Easy access to all your business’ historical records.
- Simply transfer data from one software to another.
- Sync better.
- Narrow the search process.
- Centralise business data.
Wrapping up
While you are focused on getting your business on track with emerging technologies and focusing on a few of the field service management best practices in the industry.
We at i4T Business are building software that will make your business processes efficient, transparent, compliant and secure. It is time to rethink your Field Service business best practices and deliver excellence.
With our cutting-edge technology and in-depth knowledge of how the Field Service Management sector operates, the i4TGlobal Team loves to share industry insights to help streamline your business processes and generate new leads. We are driven by innovation and are passionate about delivering solutions that are transparent, compliant, efficient and safe for all stakeholders and across all touch points.
