The concept of field service management is definitely not something reserved for major enterprises. It is a concept that can completely revolutionize an enterprise in any field which relies on deliveries or door-to-door services. Needless to say, the list of these industries and the number of such enterprises is quite impressive.
With that in mind and without further ado, here are several benefits of integrating field service management into your own small enterprise.
Fleet Tracking
One of the features that field service management software provides you with is the option of fleet tracking. This allows you to track vehicle locations at any time, thus allowing you a series of benefits.
First, you get the privilege of optimizing your routes and ensuring that your drivers are actually following a pre-planned route. If not, you could check whether there are some conditions that forced them to change this itinerary. Keep in mind that this is also an important metric regarding the reliability of your routes.
Other than this, fleet tracking also reduces the likelihood of employee theft, regardless of if it’s gas theft or doing their own chores on the company’s time. By tracking your fleet, you are also more likely to notice risky driving behavior, thus elevating the overall safety of your fleet quite drastically.
Lastly, it’s quite a powerful move from the standpoint of your logistics and even customer support. After all, you’ll know where each of your vehicles is at any given moment.
Order and Schedules
Resource management and planning is, beyond doubt, the single most important requirement for a business to succeed. Having an excellent field service management system in place will allow you to keep track of everything essential for your operational efficiency.
How, when it comes to resources available, it is important that you broaden your understanding of these concepts. For the majority of people, resources are merely tools and raw materials. On occasion, they even add human resources (manpower) to the list. However, time is also a resource (a finite one at that).
Field service management system primarily focuses on your mobile resources – teams, vehicles, equipment, and materials.
Then, there’s the issue of opportunity loss. While your manpower and equipment are tied with a certain task, they probably can’t do anything else. The best way to optimize their productivity is to make an excellent working order and assign each team/individual their personalized schedules.
Overall, organizing your staff and resources is the first prerequisite for success. It is also something you can do quite well with a field service tool on your side.
Tracking Inventory
In order to optimize your storage space and production, you need to keep a close eye on your inventory. This will help you stay alert at all times and even be aware when the time is right for you to place new orders. Besides keeping you optimally stocked, this tool will allow you to improve your relationships with strategic vendors.
Previously (in the fleet management section), we’ve already mentioned the major problem of employee theft. Even in the smallest enterprises (unfortunately, even in family businesses), this remains a major problem. Sure, there’s less to steal, but this only means that any misappropriation of resources is felt more severely. By tracking your inventory, you will be able to either prevent or detect this early.
Even without any explanation, it seems intuitive that your priority is tracking your inventory so that your in-field teams can perform their duty. This way, you will have an automated way of doing so.
A great field service management tool can also help with defect management, thus providing a higher quality of service. Nonetheless, it’s probably wiser to do this with a specialized tool.
Customer Relations
The majority of customer relations issues will have something to do with the teams that are in the field. They either:
- Need to respond to a call.
- Need to return for a fix-up.
- Need to report their whereabouts (clients are concerned that they’re still not there).
By tracking their whereabouts, you will be able to organize them and optimize their work schedule. You will also have something concrete to offer when they call to ask you a question.
The majority of tips around customer relations sound like “hire people who are ideal for the job,” etc. The problem is that your clients actually want to get useful and relevant info like – when is the problem going to be fixed? How long will it take for your team to arrive at the scene? Are they stuck in the traffic, or are they going to arrive in a matter of minutes?
Also, remember that using field services management software allows you to keep track of compliances and regulations of the industry. This will disarm any attempts of your customers to gain a legal upper hand and win in a lawsuit against you.
Immediate Benefits
The best thing about the prospect of installing a field service management tool is the fact that you get immediate benefits. The cost reduction (through optimized fuel costs) will start right away. From the first moment after you integrate the system, you will already see the savings.
The quality of service is incredible when you can make your delivery service more consistent. Again, it doesn’t take time for this to happen. This improvement will take place pretty much right away after the system integration.
Lastly, the system is cloud-based. This means that it can be accessed from any device and by any of your employees (with an adequate security clearance).
While this may not sound like that much, having an immediate solution for some of these problems can be game-changing. This is especially true if you feel like your business needs to pivot to survive.
In Conclusion
As you can see, field services management will help you keep track of all your mobile resources (teams, equipment, and resources). As a result, you will cut costs, improve customer satisfaction, and boost the operational efficiency of your enterprise. Most importantly, you will get all of these perks immediately after integrating the field services management system. These several concepts alone are more than enough to fully explain the appeal and the necessity of this investment.
