7 Reasons You Need to Give Your Technicians a Mobile Field Service Management App
Posted on 25 January, 2024 by Joy Gomez
Running a field service business is quite a challenge. It is never a one-man show. No matter how efficiently you carry out your business operations, you must rely on your technicians to run things smoothly. At the end of the day, it is their skills and expertise that drive your business, Therefore, as a business owner, it is your duty to ensure that they have all the resources to do their job perfectly. Only a few years ago, it was rather impossible to monitor and cooperate with your field workers who work away from the office, often in remote locations. However, with the advent of modern technology, the hurdle has been overcome. The industry has gone from a pen and paper industry to a full-blown digital space in the span of a few years with the help of digital tools and technologies. Along with the cutting-edge software solution, field service management apps have also played a key role in this. They simplify logistics and communication as well as increase efficiency and flexibility across business processes.
This has further accelerated with the rapid growth of smartphone usage. According to studies, the number of smartphone users is expected to exceed the five billion mark by the end of 2022. The smartphone is already well established in the field service industry and supports service technicians immensely in their daily work. Now, one might argue that all field technicians need when they arrive at their job is their tools. But there goes so much more in rendering field service that makes digital tools an absolute necessity for technicians as well. For example, your field technicians may
- Need to check inventory with the back office
- Require quick access to customer history to see if this is a recurring issue they are fixing
- Compile service reports to track the project’s status
- Collect information and business requirements in real-time
- Provide the customer with price quotes based on changes or delays
These are just some of the things a field technician must do as part of their job. The information they need to consume and collect varies and changes the moment they set foot on site. A mobile field service app allows them to have real-time communication with the head office and either request or send information through the service cloud. Fast data collection, data entry, and access to information help them save time and improve customer satisfaction.
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The benefits of the field management app go beyond this small list. In this blog, we have researched further to give you some more compelling reasons that establish this innovative tool not just as a beneficial tool, but also as a must-have for field technicians in today’s time.
1. Provide Technicians with Better Access to Necessary Information
As a supervisor or manager in a service delivery company, your number one priority is customer satisfaction, regardless of whether you are providing regular maintenance or emergency services. To ensure customer satisfaction, you must ensure your field technicians arrive with all of the information required for successful service from the first visit to the customer. With paper-based work orders, however, the information can be lost. Technicians can forget it at home, lose it on their way to the job, even confuse one work order with another and refer to an incorrect description. Even if they have the correct one with them, sometime they might not make sense of the handwriting and fail to meet the requirements. And heaven forbid if someone spills coffee on it!
The best way to avoid these issues is to send technicians all of the relevant information about customers and equipment on their smartphones. To do this, you will need a mobile app that gives technicians information about the customer, site access and contact details, the affected equipment/property, service history, and every other necessary information for the job — all easily accessible in just a couple of clicks.
2. Improve Performance
A mobile field service app helps you increase speed and efficiency. Dispatchers can easily manage schedules and insert emergency service calls between maintenance jobs. And they can immediately send the right information to the right technician to ensure the technician arrives on-site quickly and can resolve the customer issue without having to return later.
3. Avoid Miscommunication
Sending your techs into the field with all the right tools and information is key to a great customer experience. Office staff will know where their field technicians are and the status of the job. They can assign or adjust assignments based on availability and proximity. Techs can receive updates to their schedules, job details, contact information, and locations. They can also find the most efficient route to the next scheduled appointment.
4.Eliminate Redundancy and Errors
All the information from the job site is recorded and transmitted to the office in real-time, reducing the chance of errors, incorrect billing, illegible handwriting, lost estimates, etc. The technicians can also access account information and details from previous visits to ensure effective communication with the customer.
5. Assign the Right Technician to the Job
Vulnerable accounts are the first points of attack for hackers, which is why software programs need to be equipped with strong user authentication. Almost all cybersecurity apps set minimum password lengths and other requirements to encourage their users to set stronger apps. However, this doesn’t always mean that it’s secure.
To make sure users are protected from unauthorized logins, most reliable software providers offer single sign-on and multifactor authentication features. Single sign-in features make it easy to manage multiple passwords across platforms by eliminating some of the associated risks. Multifactor authentication requires users to submit an additional form of identification that’s not easy to replicate or steal. This can be a temporary SMS code or a fingerprint scan.
6. Increase Success Rates
A mobile field service management app helps you respond more effectively to customer requirements. Whether you’re providing installation, troubleshooting, or maintenance services, you must be efficient and meet contractual commitments for guaranteed service and recovery times.
7. Get Paid Faster
A good mobile field service app will allow your technicians to easily record their time, parts, and tasks against an equipment asset and work order, and sync that data into your billing system upon work order close-out, accelerating your service to cash cycle.
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Field Promax—the Best Mobile App for Your Field Technicians
You want nothing but the best for your business. So, why not the best mobile field service app for your technicians?
Field Promax offers you the best mobile app for efficient field service business. The smart, cloud-based field service management software gives you an all-around digital solution for your service delivery business, including work order management, estimates, scheduling and dispatching, invoicing, digital signature support, online payment facility, and more. For your field technicians, we offer you a GPS-powered mobile app as well.
While the app provides your field workers with seamless access to the centralized company database (thanks to the software) and connects them round the clock with the office, it also serves as an integral tool for you to manage your resources in the field more efficiently. With your technicians connected to the office through the app, you can
- Monitor your workers’ location in real-time
- Track their movement and job progress
- View time cards (when they clock in or clock out)
- Keep track of their schedule
- Notify technicians about upcoming job orders, emergency service orders, or any change in their schedule
- Receive images as proof of work
- Manage inventory better as they update parts and items used on the go
- Let technicians create invoices from the job site (one burden off your shoulder!)
- Collect payment from the customer via your technicians present in the field
There are more features to be unlocked with Field Promax mobile app. The best thing about it, however, is that it is unbelievably easy to operate. True, you cannot expect all your field workers to be tech geniuses. To use the app, however, they don’t have to be one. Some say the app is as easy as operating online messaging services. Therefore, you don’t have to worry about special training or anything.
More good news for you— the Field Promax app is available for both Android and iOS, and it runs on any device. That means your employees can use the app from their own smartphones or tabs. So, no extra budget allocation for additional devices either!
To Sum Up
As more companies transform to digital operations, service companies must also adapt and move to paperless operations to manage field technicians. To successfully evolve, they must adopt field service management software. With this type of solution, service companies can better manage service schedules and monitor service activities. And they can use a mobile app for field service management to put these capabilities right in their field technicians’ hands. In a nutshell, providing technicians with a mobile app only has advantages for companies that manage employees on the move. If your company hasn’t converted to digital operations and you’re still using pen, paper, and spreadsheets, it is time to step up the game and give your technicians the best tool to do their job right. So, go ahead and get yourself one today. Contact us for further information.