Field service companies operate within a complex economic landscape, grappling with a lot of financial challenges.
The logistics of dispatching technicians to various locations not only implies expenses but also results in extended periods of inactivity, reducing overall operational efficiency.
Furthermore, the unpredictable nature of on-site interventions often requires multiple visits to resolve a single issue, amplifying both time and monetary expenditures.
As field service companies strive to maintain high service standards and meet customer expectations, they find themselves at a crossroads, searching for innovative solutions that not only address these financial challenges but also propel them toward a more cost-effective and agile future.
Let’s dive into how remote visual support can help field service companies optimize resources while maintaining excellent service of support.
1. Traditional cost drivers in field service operations
To fully understand the size of the problem concerning the financial expenses of field service companies, it’s crucial to identify the traditional cost drivers that have long been inherent in their operations.
1.Travel costs
Technicians dispatched to various locations incur substantial travel expenses, including transportation, accommodation, and related allowances. Frequent travel not only strains the company’s budget but also results in a big environmental impact. The cost of one truck roll goes up to 500$. An average SMB sends up to 10 trucks per day which leads to increased expenses on a daily basis. Yearly, it transforms into 75,000 kg of CO2 emissions per company.
2. Downtime
On the customer’s side, extended periods of inactivity during on-site interventions contribute to downtime, impacting both the efficiency of service delivery and the overall productivity of the company. Multiple site visits to resolve a single issue extend the downtime, amplifying the financial toll on the company. Prolonged downtime negatively impacts customer satisfaction and can result in financial penalties following service-level agreement (SLA) violations.
3. Inefficient resource allocation
Ineffective utilization of skilled resources leads to higher labor costs and a potential loss of revenue opportunities. The lack of real-time visibility into field operations hampers the company’s ability to proactively allocate resources based on expertise and workload.
2. What is remote visual support?
Remote visual support leverages real-time video communication, enabling experts to collaborate virtually with on-site technicians, diagnose problems, and guide them through solutions.
Field service companies can also benefit from real-time video calls before a technician is dispatched. Remote visual support plays an important role in a work order qualification stage.
Once the expert in the office receives the request from the customer, he can trigger a real-time call to gain visibility of the issue. The expert can switch between the customer’s front and back cameras, take snapshots, exchange relevant media files, and use collaborative tools to annotate. At the end of the session, the recording is saved inside the work order and can be accessed directly in the field service management software from desktop or mobile. The latter is especially useful for technicians who tend to be in mobility a lot.
Let’s break down how remote visual support integrated into field service management software helps optimize resources of field service companies.
2.1. Mitigate travel costs
By incorporating remote visual support directly into field service management software, companies enable technicians to troubleshoot issues virtually using an asynchronous video report. This diminishes the need for extensive travel, significantly reducing transportation, accommodation, and related expenses.
Similarly in real-time collaboration, technicians can receive guidance, share visual data, and collaboratively problem-solve without the need to travel.
2.2. Reduce downtime
Real-time collaboration powered by annotating tools enables experts to diagnose problems promptly. This results in faster solutions, reducing the downtime associated with on-site interventions. Sometimes the breakdown is not significant and can be resolved fully remotely.
Following the same approach, even partial resolution can save the asset from collapse and the need to be fully replaced. Timely response with remote visual support is a foundation for service continuity even at times when maintenance is needed.
2.3. Optimize resource allocation
Remote visual support facilitates skill-based assignments. Companies can organize their support teams by the specialization of the experts and technicians. Once the customer troubleshoots, the dedicated team will receive notification avoiding the burden of being redirected from expert to expert until it reaches the right one.
When the problem is qualified and the right technician is dispatched, he can use the most optimized route to reach the customer thanks to the guidance from field service management software. Without it, a trip on-site would be longer, expensive, and polluting.
2.4. Enhancing data-driven decision-making
Upon its request, a field service company can enable the archiving of the video support sessions that can be rewatched to understand the customers better, identify recurring issues, and what practices are the most effective. The usage of such a repository is broad. In general, these insights into performance, resolution times, and resource utilization help companies make more informed decisions, identify trends, and continuously refine their operations for maximum cost efficiency.
3. Conclusion
The introduction of remote visual support as a solution heralds a new era of technological advancements for field service companies. This technology, seamlessly integrated into field service management software, not only addresses the financial challenges outlined but also presents a new way to optimize resources without compromising on quality.
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