Field service management software is a critical tool in modern electrical businesses. A field service management software packs a ton of benefits for your field service business, including improved invoicing and quoting, better customer satisfaction, and better job scheduling for your crew.
However, according to statistics, only 52% of businesses have incorporated field service management software into their workflow.
What is Field Service Management?
Field service management is the coordination and optimization of materials and human resources in in-field services that involve installation, maintenance, or repair at the client’s site. For an electrical business, this includes equipment and wiring installations, troubleshooting, maintenance, and repair.
The primary goal of field service management is to improve productivity. In turn, profits and customer satisfaction also get boosted.
In most electrical businesses, field service management is a vague concept, with the actual process carried out using disparate manual techniques. These processes are inefficient and often bring a host of challenges to the business surrounding scheduling, reporting, and tracking of the activities carried out by your crew.
Modern field service management uses field service management software. This software provides a smart platform for managing services and teams on the go, ensuring all processes are fast and efficient and the electrical business operates optimally and satisfies customer needs.
Field service management software serves employees at all hierarchical levels. The sales representative can use it to win bids and quotes, the technicians can report on a job’s progress, the team leader can monitor all work and schedule jobs, and the accounting team can send and process invoices.
Challenges That Necessitate a Business to Have a Field Service Management Software
Without proper field service management software, an electrical business is susceptible to several challenges. One of the most significant ones is workforce strain.
The tasks required to keep an electrical business running are complex. With manual field service management, your workforce can be strained, trying to render their services while managing different assets or processes.
Data shows that these activities can also become overwhelming given North America’s shortage of electricians, which is putting a significant strain on existing electrical businesses.
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Field management software automates these critical processes, ensuring that your workforce only focuses on essential work that makes them productive.
Manual field service management is also highly prone to scheduling conflicts. Access to data and information is also limited, with a high rate of miscommunication and wasted trips to and from the office to get the field jobs done.
Field service management software ensures fast and accurate communication with remote access to information for your crew and administrative team at the office to prevent miscommunication and scheduling conflicts.
For electrical companies that have tried automating their field service management, initial solutions were disparate, making them hard to integrate and manage. An all-in-one solution ensures a smoother field service management experience using a system that’s easy to use by all teams with enterprise-wide visibility of the company’s resources and necessary information.
Research shows that this ease of use is the number one reason why 74% of companies adopted field service management software.
The Benefits of Field Service Management Software
The following are some benefits your business will gain from integrating electrical contractor software.
1. Improved Employee Productivity
Field service management software helps improve employee productivity by automating repetitive tasks and making more complex ones easier to accomplish.
For instance, instead of manually processing a client’s booking, which can be very time-consuming, a technician can book a customer for a visit through a few clicks on the software. With the time and effort saved, they can focus on other essential tasks, such as fulfilling pending work orders.
Employee productivity in your electrical business also gets a boost through effective communication. Research shows that more connected employees are better performers.
By improving their productivity, your employees will offer better service to customers and improve your bottom line.
2. Happier Customers
Research shows that businesses prioritizing customer experience outperform others by about 80%. Field service management software improves your electrical business’s customer experience by offering the customer faster service, better communication, and greater visibility into their data in your business.
Within the service industry, delivery speed is crucial. Field service management software automates and eases heavy management duties giving your team more time to focus on the customer and service delivery.
The software also allows for faster and more seamless communication with clients. Through the CRM, you maintain updated information about the client to know their needs and the various communication channels you can use to reach them.
Customers also use the software to get the information they need about your services and any essential updates such as booking details, payments, and invoices.
3. Improved Decision Making
Through the scheduling feature, field service management software helps improve decision-making, such as scheduling recurring jobs and assigning new ones to available crew members.
The electrical project manager can quickly assign each technician specific tasks and decide who should take up which work orders based on experience and other factors such as availability. The assigned technician can also view crucial job details such as technical sheets and equipment records.
With rich and updated customer information from the CRM, your business can make better decisions about which services the customers enjoy the most, which ones should be added based on demand, and what can be changed in existing services based on customer feedback.
4. Better Inventory Management
Electrician service management software comes with inventory management features that make it easier to streamline your electrical business’s inventory. Therefore, you can easily organize, track, order, and re-order inventory based on usage and update the numbers on the go.
Advanced software also comes with warning systems to alert you when inventory is below a specified threshold.
5. Faster Invoicing
Field service management software digitizes invoicing, speeding up how quickly customers receive their quotes and invoices and honor their payments.
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For instance, technicians can update their job status on the go and trigger automatic invoicing once they complete the job. The software can send automatic reminders to ensure clients honor their payments quickly.
6. Improved Scheduling and Dispatching
Proper scheduling and dispatching are essential to ensuring that you deliver the best services to your customers quickly and by the right technician. Field service management software makes scheduling and dispatching easier, using factors such as skill, inventory, location, and knowledge to determine who’s best for a particular electrical job.
It’s also quicker to reassign tasks in unexpected situations and ensure the crew can handle other jobs after altering the original plan.
7. Improved Information Capturing and Storage
Electrical businesses suffer significantly from a lack of centralized and accessible information to help in field service management. Field service management software ensures all information is stored and accessed centrally, making accessing essential information such as job histories and customer data easier.
Invest in the Best Software from a Trusted Vendor
Field service management software will make your electrical business more efficient, improve service delivery, and boost your bottom line. Try FieldBin free and transform how you manage your electrical business.