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ServicePower and Qton Solutions have formed a strategic partnership to provide optimised workforce management solution for the metering industry which will expedite services and reduce costs.

ServicePower Technologies Plc market leader in field service management technology, today announced that it has signed a strategic partnership with Qton Solutions, the field service management software specialist in the UK metering industry.

Qton’s platform, hosted and managed in the cloud, provides drag-and-drop scheduling of jobs, mobile dispatch with real-time status updates, and fully customisable industry compliant workflows which facilitate on-site data capture.  By including ServicePower’s ServiceScheduling incorporating the latest optimisation algorithms, Qton’s work order management and mobile dispatch technology now includes intelligent, intra-day, schedule optimisation. Work orders will be created in Qton, optimised, and continuously re-optimised in ServiceScheduling, and dispatched to the metering field technicians.

Adam Bowen, Head of Operations, Qton Solutions, stated “The Qton field service management platform provides robust mobile workforce management functionality for metering services within the utilities industry. Integration of the ServiceScheduling optimisation technologies enables us to offer true route optimisation in addition to the drag-and-drop scheduling our platform was designed to support. ServiceScheduling integrated to our platform enables Qton to bring higher levels of efficiency and productivity to the industry, while maintaining the same level of customisable mobile workflow so necessary within the utilities sector.”

 

Marne Martin, CEO, ServicePower, stated “This is yet another partnership for ServicePower which broadens its reach into new verticals. ServiceScheduling will provide the advanced optimisation technology which Qton’s utility customers require to ensure the lowest cost maintenance schedules and highest levels of customer service, through offering real time, accurate appointments to the industry. The partnership gives customers a choice and also offers the product as a service which broadens our larger cloud-based offering. By working with Qton, ServicePower is able to grow its utilities customer base in the UK. This partnership further demonstrates our commitment to ServicePower’s partner ecosystem. We will achieve growth through integrating our technology with innovative partners whom extend our functional, geographical and execution reach, in addition to generating our own organic sales.”

 

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Field service organisations face increasing competition, declining margin and high customer expectations. But, they also are challenged by new technologies, such as social, mobile, cloud, analytics, IoT and M2M, and wearables. Each new technology has potential to revolutionise field service just as field mobility technology did several years ago. Marne Martin, CEO of ServicePower looks at why technology is just one ingredient in field service excellence.. 

ServicePower is spending much time and effort in innovating our field service management software. We are working hard to be innovative and stay ahead of the latest technologies such that our customers have the best in class FSM solution today, but are also positioned to take advantage of new advances as they hit the market. We are completely mobilising the field service call, enabling the field based tech to complete all onsite processes in one trip. We’re incorporating social collaboration to ensure that the tech has access to materials and expert assistance from the office to get the job finished. We’re partnering with one of the world’s leading research institutions, the University of Manchester, to further improve our scheduling algorithms.

Our hard work has been recognised through winning the 2014 M2M Evolution for IOT Excellence Award, and being named as a Visionary by Gartner in its 2014 Magic Quadrant for Field Service Management.

 

However, we cannot dismiss perhaps the most important element in the delivery of field based services: the field technician.

How does the emerging workforce, which is young, technically savvy and collaborative, affect your ability to provide exceptional field service? Let’s look at the following important issues regarding the technicians in your workforce.

Recruitment

One of the top challenges field service organisations face right now is the retiring workforce. However, according to Aberdeen more than half of field service organisations wait until there is an opening to fill to recruit a new technician, rather than doing so proactively. While it’s important to find a great technician with the skills required to perform the services offered by the organisation, it’s just as important to also understand the needs and motivations of its young (averaging 32 years old), technically savvy recruits, and do so prior to needing to fill a position. To that end, it’s also important to identify what will ensure the highest retention rates with the new workforce.

Technology Adoption

With the young, and we’re really talking about Millennials, which in 2015 are projected to surpass the Baby Boom generation as the largest living generation, comes adoption of more and more consumer oriented technologies. Aberdeen says that 62% of best-in-class field service organisations are incorporating some level of BYOD strategy. That’s happening because these young recruits are helping to speed the transition due to high adoption rates of mobile, connected technologies for personal use. As a matter of fact, in America, 2 of every 5 households only have wireless telephones. Technology is changing our personal and professional lives.

Service Evolution

The newest generation of young, tech savvy and collaborative field service technicians grew up with computers and social networks, text, email and chat. It’s how they communicate.

This isn’t a negative for field service. Adoption of these communication methods only improves customer service. As we field service management software vendors improve our ability to ensure the tech with the right skills and best knowledge of or proximity to the service location are intelligently scheduled, as with the ServicePower ServiceScheduling product, field technicians armed and comfortable with the latest mobile technologies can tap into the social, mobile and cloud technologies, as well as utilise wearables, to diagnose an issue while onsite, access the documentation or videos and chat or video chat with experts in the office whom can help ensure that the product is fixed in one truck roll.

 

For the customer, further downtime and inconvenience are eliminated. For the field service organisation, costs are minimised, customer satisfaction and brand loyalty are improved.

Strategy

Field technicians are your face to the customer. They are often the only point of contact a customer has with your organisation post sale. So, how do we find the best and brightest field technicians, and keep them?

• Proactively identify what your customers want.
• The Boomers are retiring. Proactively identify how to attract Millennials to your organisation.
• Identify how to keep workers engaged with your field service operation
  • Train them effectively
  • Offer and support utilisation new technologies such as wearables, which contribute to their success.
  • Provide access to the tools, information and experts to make them heroes to your customers
• Support social communications
  • Document how and when to use it for company purposes. A 140 character Tweet can be a huge PR success or a nightmare for your operation
• Encourage adoption of new technologies like route optimization, IoT and M2M and video. The business value of these tools empowers the field technician to create happy customers and make their own day a success![/unordered_list]

 

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ServicePower Technologies have announced that it has signed a contract with a leading US based manufacturer and marketer of automotive appearance protection products, PermaPlate Inc., which will implement ServiceOperations to reduce administration, cut costs and improve the service levels delivered to customers.

PermaPlate, headquartered in Utah, manufactures and distributes appearance protection products which protect the interior and exterior surfaces of vehicles; it also underwrites vehicle appearance warranties. PermaPlate will use ServiceOperations to intelligently dispatch work to contractors in markets where service is required, as well as create robust claims payment authorisation processes for its experienced technician network.

PermaPlate works in a fiercely competitive sector and in order to improve services to customers it has enlisted ServicePower’s product and development teams to produce new features within the application which facilitate the discreet logic required to manage a network of 3^rd party contractors so that they can deliver more competitive SLAs. Repair claims will also be managed through ServiceOperations, providing robust validation logic to the customer to enhance its warranty management process.

Victor Diercksen, Director of Business Technology, PermaPlate Inc., commented “Our dedication to quality products and superior customer service has driven growth of 50% year over year for the past 3 years.  Our growth was severely straining our legacy service management system which was in dire need of replacement.  We took this opportunity to upscale to an enterprise quality system like ServicePower to improve our service times while reducing or eliminating manual processes.  ServicePower is the latest in a series of investments in business systems that will allow PermaPlate to maintain its leadership position in the automotive appearance protection industry.”

Marne Martin, CEO, ServicePower, stated “We are really pleased to be working with another world-class organisation, in a new vertical, that sees the benefits of our cloud based, 3rd party ServiceOperations product. Using Operations, PermaPlate Inc. will be able to manage its resources intelligently and cost effectively to meet demand.

 

“PermaPlate benefits from our early investment in a completely industry agnostic, truly multi-tenant SaaS application in ServiceOperations, which continues to differentiate ServicePower from other Field Service Management vendors. We’re able to offer true hosted, intelligent, dynamic dispatch and warranty claim management to clients who utilise 3^rd party contractors or vendor partners in their service delivery equations. Our team of field service experts provides the experience critical to our customers’ success by not only advising how best to set up the software, but by providing advice and industry best practices in  managing a connected, contracted workforce.

“With continued enhancements to ServiceOperations, part of our connected field management platform, which provides industry acknowledged scheduling optimisation, cutting edge mobile technology and asset tracking, robust business intelligence, M2M Connected Services and Smart Scheduling of mixed labor pools, ServicePower has positioned itself as not only a visionary, but as a field service management solution of choice to organisations which endeavour to operate most efficiently in today’s changing field service environment.”

 

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ServicePower a market leader in field service management technology, is pleased to announce that it has signed a five year contract for its ServiceScheduling solution with a leading global manufacturer of hot water products.

The client manufactures and distributes smart, sustainable, integrated climate and sanitary hot water products, such as biomass, solar thermal, heat pumps and micro-CHP heating solutions. The manufacturer operates in 70 countries worldwide, including Germany, France and the UK, as well as Eastern Europe, North America and China.

 

 ServicePower’s patented ServiceScheduling technology will provide the client with on-premise industry leading scheduling technology for both employed and dedicated contracted labour in Europe, beginning with Germany and expanding to France and the UK.  ServiceScheduling will enhance the flexibility, responsiveness and productivity of its field service team, while also providing it with the localisation and product features to support rollouts in countries across the globe.

 

Additionally ServiceScheduling will facilitate simpler installation and maintenance of the client’s hallmark brands by optimising the deployment of a variety of labour resources.

Commenting on the agreement Marne Martin, CEO of ServicePower said "This latest customer win demonstrates further progress of the expansion of ServicePower into continental Europe and underlines the capability of our solutions to support global businesses.

Our continued investment in technology innovation was fundamental in this client’s decision to contract with ServicePower. We look forward to supporting our newest client as its deployments expand globally and its products evolve to include more IoT and M2M connectivity to offer increasingly proactive services which lower energy bills and reduce carbon emissions.”

 

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Find out more about ServicePower in the Field Service News Directory here 

 

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ServicePower Contact information:

Email: hello@servicepower.com
Web: www.servicepower.com/
Phone: 
[unordered_list style="bullet"]

• EMEA HQ: + 44 (0)161 476 2277
• US HQ: +1(703) 287 8900

Social: 

• Facebook
• Twitter
• LinkedIn
• Instagram 

 

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Services Provided by ServicePower:

ServicePower, recognised by Gartner as a visionary in the 2014 Magic Quadrant for Field Service Management, provides a global, connected, end-to-end field service management platform, which includes[unordered_list style="bullet"]

• ServiceScheduling- industry leading optimised scheduling and routing software which provides true intra-day optimisation of field based resources
• ServiceMobility-cutting edge, device and OS agnostic mobile dispatching software
• Nexus FS-business management
• ServiceGPS-asset tracking software, integrated to both ServiceScheduling and ServiceMobility
• ServiceOperations-true multitenant SaaS 3^rd party contractor dispatching and warranty claims payment software
• ServiceMarket-job dispatching software which also provides an on demand marketplace of vetted, credentialed technicians
• ServiceStats- in memory business intelligence for our entire platform
• M2M Connected Services-utilizes connected machine data to intelligently and automatically dispatch technicians for forecasted field based maintenance and real time repairs
• Smart Scheduling Broker-enables clients to intelligently mix multiple labor forces, including employed and 3^rd party to achieve desired business goals
• ServiceOutsourcing-outsourced service management provided by the ServicePower team of field service leaders, using our software platform

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All about ServicePower:

ServicePower provides connected field services solutions that bring together the customer and the dispatch centre, technician, claims and warranty processes, parts, the contracted workforce, assets, mobility, business intelligence, and social collaboration.

ServicePower connects all aspects of the field service value chain through the use of innovative technology that accelerates business efficiency gains and customer satisfaction while reducing costs. ServicePower is uniquely positioned to offer connected field services solutions on one underlying and consistent platform.

This is the ServicePower difference.

 

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Latest videos from ServicePower:

ServicePower Overview:

Connected Field Service Solutions:

 

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Latest resources from ServicePower:

Field Service Management - the changing technology landscape

A detailed exploration of the trends, technologies and emerging business models appearing in field service including a look at the key field service trends, the confusing field service management landscape, flexible field service management software and a look at the Gartner Magic Quadrant for field service management...

Click here to read more... 

Schedule Optimisation: Things aren't equal

The world of schedule and route optimisation has been with us for many years. ServicePower is one of the longest-standing vendors who helped innovate and develop the market and its identity. The Mobile Workforce Management market maybe isn’t as established yet as the more traditional Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) counterparts but it is fast-growing in terms of maturity, acceptance, and demand.

Click here to read more...

 

 

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Latest news and feature from ServicePower:

Click here to access the latest news and features from Service Power

 

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Marne Martin, CEO of award winning software provider ServicePower takes a look at what the Field Service should look like in the not so distant future...

Today, field service organisations face increasing competition, changing customer dynamics, reduced margins and are increasingly challenged to achieve corporate metrics. Each must look toward technology that will improve its competitive edge and increase productivity, efficiency, and customer satisfaction. Intelligent, integrated scheduling, mobile and business intelligence technologies must be deployed to:

• Intelligently schedule the best labour resource, whether that’s an employee in a company truck or a 3rd party contractor, to meet customer requirements
• Optimise employee schedules to achieve the greatest levels of productivity, efficiency and SLA compliance
• Fully mobilise onsite processes, ensuring the job is completed, to the customer’s satisfaction, in a single truck roll, driving down schedule costs and repeat trips
• Continuously analyse and fine tune the overall operation through real time, data driven decision making

All in a fully mobile way. Consumers, used to instant access to the web, expect field services to be provided now. They expect technicians to be provisioned with the necessary tools and technology to show up on time, access the parts and other resources needed.

Intelligent Scheduling

Only software solutions provide field service organization with the technology required to schedule field based resources to meet not only customer commitments but do so in such a way as to reduce its overcall costs through optimisation and intelligent deployment of both employed and third party labour.

Demand fluctuation caused by seasonality,for instance, creates unnecessary cost and dissatisfied customers if response time are extended. Additionally, parts, extra labor or helpers, and jobs which require compliance to strict SLAs can’t be efficiently scheduled without an intelligent scheduling application.

This is where intelligent software solutions are invaluable as they consider data and existing schedules to make the best scheduling decisions for the company.

Optimisation

Real time, or intra-day, optimisation is crucial to the achievement of the highest productivity and efficiency.

Manual scheduling, which relies on human capability and emotion, entails a user building and managing a schedule. It is labour intensive and rarely considers travel and cannot be automated to adapt to change or exception management. Manual scheduling just can’t scale for future growth.

 

Rules based scheduling automatically builds a schedule based on simple computer logic, filling an open schedule slot. However it does not continuously move previously scheduled jobs to ensure the least costly total schedule looking also at technician skills, parts availability or travel. Intelligent Scheduling, based on artificial intelligence, delivers true optimisation. In this scenario, schedules are created and continuously and automatically changed to achieve cost, margin, cycle time and customer satisfaction metrics. Priorities can also be dynamically adjusted to changing business needs or KPI goals using also real time mobile status reporting, GPS and other parts and job information.

Only solutions that offer true optimised scheduling including intelligent routing provide field service organisations with the technology to achieve its goals while improving satisfaction, building brand loyalty and positive social networks.

Real time, Data Driving Decision Making

Field service does not exist in a box where the environment never changes. Each operation must continuously collect data, from all parts of its service ecosystem, analyse that data, and use the data to fine tune operations. Field service is a continuously evolving entity that must adapt in order to compete and exceed customer expectations.

The Future is here. Right now. New technological innovations, such as connected machines, are driving further innovation within the within the field service industry.

For instance, sensor information (M2M data) from connected devices, like security systems, building systems and vending achines, can be used to initiate repairs based on a detected failure.

 

However, that same M2M data, as well as other information, such as manufacturing data, can be used to model and predict  equipment failure, enabling the field service organisation to predict the failure of an elevator or power generator, and send a technician to maintain it, before it breaks, minimising customer down time. New technologies are enabling an evolution from the

traditional break/fix repair model, to a proactive, preventative maintenance model, which reduces costs for the field service organisation through higher first time fix rates, and improves customer satisfaction and loyalty due to decreased down time.

ServicePower, named Visionary in the Gartner 2014 Magic Quadrant for Field Service and recipient of the 2014 M2M Evolution IoT Excellence Award provide connected mobile field services solutions that bring together all aspects of the field service value chain, including the customer and the dispatch center, technician, claims and warranty processes, parts, the contracted workforce, assets, mobility, business intelligence, and social collaboration.

Through continuous innovative, like M2M Connected Service, industry acknowledged optimisation technology and cutting edge mobility, our software accelerates business efficiency gains and customer satisfaction while reducing costs, on one underlying and consistent platform. We offer field service experts that have managed businesses and field teams understanding customer’s needs and pain points.

Don’t let your field service organisation be stuck in yesterday. Implement technology to meet your cost, margin, cycle time and customer satisfaction metrics today, and future proof your operation through deployment of the latest, continuously improved field service management technologies.

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ServicePower have shown a further investment in their product platform, as a result of continued growth in the European market, by implementing extensions to its German and the Czech solutions as well as the US Territory of Puerto Rico, supporting recent customer wins in these regions and expansion with existing customers.

ServiceScheduling, which uses a proprietary artificial intelligence-based algorithm to route and optimise employed or dedicated field resources, previously supported travel calculation in North America, including the US and Canada, and in Europe, including Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Denmark, Finland, France, Italy, Norway, Ireland, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK.  Now it has been further upgraded to support travel logic in Germany, including the new pre calculated, in memory travel data to support real time field service environments.

Also the system has been improved and now includes support for complete application translation to the German language, ensuring a fully localised user experience. This latest release will also support multiple languages within the same deployment, including on premise or hosted instances, a key requirement for the Company’s multinational client base.

ServiceMobility has been enhanced to support complete localisation, including language, and other critical data such as dates, times and user location information, for the Czech Republic. This extension, as well as several additional planned geographical deployment expansions, enhances ServicePower’s ability to support its international clients, as well as improve its penetration outside the North American and UK markets.  Mobility will also be extended to field based teams in Puerto Rico.

Marne Martin, CEO of ServicePower, commented, "ServicePower continues to invest in our platform, driving innovation and improved market penetration for our shareholders.

“ServiceScheduling, our flagship optimised routing product, continues to outperform competitive products, with proven superiority in real time optimisation, part scheduling, in memory travel calculation and M2M data utilisation, as well as growing multinational support. ServiceMobility is enjoying similar success, providing new features and support of diverse device deployments within employed or third party field service networks. Our investment decisions continue to position ServicePower well for future market growth.”