Field service management software helps companies send technicians to customers’ sites to provide technical services related to the installation, repair, and maintenance of equipment, devices, and systems. These systems can be managed, maintained and monitored under service contracts.
Advantages of Field Service Management Software
Higher efficiency
Digital interaction between customers, dispatchers and technicians enables service requests to be handled more efficiently. Other features such as redundancy checking and suggested solutions for easy-to-fix problems further reduce the number of service requests.
Lower costs
Deployment planning systems - especially with fully automated planning - save travel costs and time, increase the number of jobs per technician per day. Together with a mobile solution, this can save 20 percent or more in costs.
More transparency
By means of mobile solutions, the technicians are always well informed and can also manage unplanned situations independently. Dispatchers always maintain an overview of the status of orders and the utilization of technicians through the deployment planning software.
Higher customer satisfaction
Faster response times, adherence to SLAs and deadlines, and a high first-time-fix rate increase customer satisfaction and ensure long-term customer relationships.
Main functions of Field Service Management Software
Typically, Field Service Management solutions provide one or more of the following key functions:
Manage the worklist
Dispatchers handle the receipt of demands from external sources, coming from customers (via multiple channels) or via Internet-of-Things (IoT) connections, and also import demands from internal systems such as ticketing or enterprise asset management systems.
Plan the work
Dispatchers distribute orders to resources such as technicians and teams, but also schedule tools and vehicles, taking into account qualifications, availability, spare parts requirements and travel times.
Inform technicians and document deployment
Technicians receive all the necessary information on the site, the reported problem, the documentation on the system and historical deployment information via mobile apps and are thus optimally prepared for the deployment. They then document the execution of the job via the mobile app with working times, spare parts, logs and checklists.
Components of Field Service Management Software
Field service management software consists of a scheduling or dispatching tool like NEO Schedule and a mobile solution or app like NEO Mobile for service technicians.
Dispatchers use the dispatching software to plan orders for service technicians. Planning is done either manually or semi-automatically or fully automatically with a scheduling tool such as NEO Optimizer. Route planning calculates the most efficient routes possible, which can either be particularly fast (time factor) or direct (route factor).
Technicians receive their orders on their smartphone, tablet or laptop via the mobile solution or app. This contains all the necessary information about the order. After they have completed the maintenance or repair, they document their work in the app. This data is then transferred to the back end, where it may be checked, further processed and archived.
In addition to the two main components of the deployment planning and mobile solution, there are other modules that complement the service process and can map it digitally from end to end.
These include, for example, customer or self-service portals such as the
NEO Service Portal
which provide customers with information to solve problems with plants or machines themselves or simply to make an appointment online around the clock.
Augmented reality applications and modules such as NEO Remote Service and the AR Worker support technicians on site by providing virtual instructions or experts remotely.
Dashboard modules like
NEO Insight
provide evaluations of the data collected by the technicians and thus enable maximum transparency about machine conditions, processes and productivity. This provides decision-makers with an optimal basis for their capacity and resource planning.
Relevant industries for field service management software
Field service solutions offer advantages wherever technical resources are planned, travel times are incurred as part of technical processing, and services need to be documented. These include industries such as mechanical and plant engineering, transportation and utility companies, medical equipment manufacturers, heating, air conditioning and ventilation equipment manufacturers, agricultural machinery manufacturers as well as specialty vehicles, household appliance manufacturers, and pure service providers.
Company size for Field Service Management Software
Field service management systems are already worthwhile for companies with 25 or more technicians in the field. The benefit for companies increases significantly the more technicians are controlled via the software. Another indicator is the number of operations per day or week. Service organizations, whose technicians usually work on longer-term jobs over several days or weeks, benefit especially from the digital documentation of jobs with forms and photos.
NEO Suite references
