Our top 6 features released in 2022 for new levels of field service automation
In response to customer and industry challenges, this year we’ve made it a priority for our customers to achieve new levels of efficiency. With the field service industry rapidly changing, it has become more critical for field service organizations to address today’s challenges.
Common challenges that our customers have voiced are:
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Outdated customer communication processes resulting in a lack of interaction and inconsistent customer experience.
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Inefficient scheduling, leading to technician inefficiency and delivering sub-par customer experience.
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Time-consuming administrative processes that are dominating resource time and negatively impacting productivity.
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And playing the guessing game concerning workforce management, resulting in inadequate staffing of teams and inefficiency during seasonal changes.
Fieldcode’s latest FSM feature releases address these challenges. Enabling a seamless link between operations and customer engagement, transparency, and optimization across different service areas and ensuring the right information is available at the right time. In this blog, we will go over our latest releases and specifically cover our top 6 show-stopping features released in 2022!
1. Forecasting
Our predictive analytics feature is an integral part of making workforce management decisions. It gives you the power to understand your future needs and makes sure your workforce is prepared for your future volumes. Forecasting allows you to be prepared to onboard new staff, train existing colleagues, or reassign when volumes change. The key benefit is that you’ll be prepared and act in advance instead of reacting to changes when it is too late.
2. Customer portal
Through our digital customer portal, businesses can start delivering the service customers crave, access to information, and field service experts when they need them. Customers have the power to self-serve, and receive all relevant updates automatically by email, SMS, or the mobile app to ensure a unified customer experience.
A key benefit is that customers have control of their time. Customers schedule appointments according to their availability. There is no need to spend time reaching out directly to service providers. Customers can digitally raise new service requests and reschedule or cancel appointments if service is no longer needed. In addition, customers receive delay notifications on the technician's location and estimated time of arrival.
3. Fieldcode mobile application (FMA) service delivery
Through the Fieldcode mobile app, your mobile service delivery workforce is supported through their daily activities with information such as schedule details, customer info, communication details, order status updates, and on-map route information.
Our newly added service delivery feature allows technicians to complete more tasks simultaneously instead of completing each task in sequential order. This key time-saving benefit allows work orders to be worked on in parallel and creates more accurate reports. For example, a technician working on two servers at a data center can start working on the second server while the first server finishes updating, allowing the technician to efficiently work on two work order tickets at the same site.
4. Real-time recommendations from the scheduling assistant
Our scheduling assistant is a software-supported dispatching tool that offers dispatchers real-time scheduling recommendations. This time-saving feature helps dispatchers in situations such as when a customer needs a technician on a specific day or if a dispatcher isn’t sure which technician is best to send. The key benefit here is that it allows dispatchers to see who is the nearest qualified available engineer, even if the dispatcher is not aware of the area. For example, a dispatcher based in one country who needs to schedule a ticket in another country can seamlessly optimize their technicians.
5. Earliest Service Delivery Time (ESDT) scheduling feature
This feature plays an integral role in scheduling efficiency. It helps dispatchers avoid assigning work orders too early. For example, annual meetings, short-term installations, and maintenance should occur on a specific day or period and not earlier (i.e., every 12 months, not 11). The key benefit is customers receive the service they need at a time necessary and not earlier.
6. Optimizer (Autonomous dispatching)
The optimizer is an indispensable, fully automated scheduling tool that automatically chooses the best scheduling option and provides dispatchers with the best routes for engineers. The optimizer provides the benefits of reacting flexibly to changing schedules or events and optimizes technician efficiency and routes.
It calculates various factors such as pick-up and drop-off locations (PUDO) for equipment and parts, technician availability and skills required, real-time traffic data, travel time to and from, and km required. Without this tool, these factors can be difficult to factor in. A dispatcher might forget to consider one of these elements and unintentionally set back the day’s schedule. In addition, the Optimizer will move appointments around, considering any limitations the dispatcher has established (such as customer availability or priority for emergencies), and optimize the schedule.
Learn more
Fieldcode has supported seamless FSM integration and mobile solutions for businesses around the world. These are just a few features Fieldcode released in 2022. To learn more, you can schedule a personalized demo session, customized to meet your organization’s specific needs and see how implementing Fieldcode can advance your mobile workforce, help optimize your organization’s field operations and deliver superior service. Or to start implementing, create a free account here.