ARCHIVE FOR THE ‘software-and-apps’ CATEGORY

Road Traffic Solutions, a traffic management organisation who supported the management of the roads throughout the London Olympics and the Royal Wedding have been able to save thousands of pounds in administration costs having switched to a new paperless means of working.

The company who moved onto the MyMobileWorkers‘ system in October have already seen significant savings not only by reducing the amount of time spent on administration but also by cutting out a whopping 1.2 tonnes of paper. To put that into context as well as being great for the environment it equates to a real world saving of almost £12,000 in the five months since they adopted the workforce management app.

RTS staff carry out around 18,000 jobs a year from minor street works in city centres to motorway closures and diversions. The 50 workers now complete job information on the go, which dramatically reduced the administrative burden that RTS had whilst previously logging this information on paper.

The field staff use the MyMobileWorkers app to record information such as proving which items are with which worker at a specific time, details of where the items are being delivered to, and specifically where on the road they are due to be placed,

This has given RTS instant visibility with photographic evidence, of their workflow as opposed to having to wait until the worker has returned to the office and the job being logged as completed which was the process previously.

As well as  delivering cost savings the switch has also provided RTS with improved location and management of their own hire equipment. The result of this is that staff can now search and view instantly which items are in use on which job, allowing them to see which items are missing and at what stage of the job.

Of course as with any field service technology RTS have been able to importantly translate the benefits to their customers also who now have instant access to job details and photographic proof of job completion.

Ben Dexter, Associate Director from RTS said: “Previously we were having a complete nightmare with masses of paperwork and as a company which is growing rapidly, we were looking for a new way of working to ensure our processes were as efficient and streamlined as they could be.

“With all new technology, there can be a degree of uncertainty amongst the workforce as to how it works but MyMobileWorkers was simple to use and within a month, all of our 50 workers were up and running, and using it on their Android devices.”

Graham Whistance, founder of MyMobileWorkers, said: “As Road Traffic Solutions is one of the fastest growing companies in the traffic management sector, they needed the technology alongside this to help them grow further.

“MyMobileWorkers works particularly well in the fast paced environment of the traffic management sector where managers rely on real time updates and the need for accurate job information to be recorded. With Road Traffic Solutions for example, they need to ensure that any of their equipment such as temporary traffic signals or cones, are accounted for when being picked up after a job is finished.”

We’ve talked much about software as a service on field service news over the last few months.

We’ve explored whether the platform will become the great leveller in the field service industry as for the first time smaller, more agile companies are able to afford access to the sophisticated and powerful service management software systems that boast numerous benefits such as increasing efficiency, improving first time fix rates, and of course improving the level of service you can deliver to your customers. Not so long ago these systems were the domain of enterprise size companies solely.

The SaaS revolution changed that.

Then we delved further into the cloud and took with us some of the big questions that for many remained unanswered. The man we sought to give us the answers to these was both a service management software stalwart with over twenty five years experience designing service management software, but also somewhat of a visionary having been the first to develop a browser based service management solution way back in 2004.  Incidentally, he was also the first to develop a system for Windows as well.

In case you missed it you can find this interview here in our first ever podcast, where we spoke to Colin Brown, Managing Director of Tesseract and we tackle the major concerns around SaaS such as connectivity issues, integration problems, security fears, why major companies such as SAP and Oracle were so slow to adopt the model, plus also looking in more detail at the benefits of the cloud and some really fascinating insight into how the industry has changed in the twenty five years Colin has been building service management software.

However, we have realised that to fully get a grip on how the field service industry is reacting to both the cloud in general and software as a service as a delivery model then there is one remaining person we need to hear from. You.

We want to understand how you the field service managers are working, or not working with SaaS. We want to know if it appeals to you or if it doesn’t. We want to know the reasons why and why not.

So we are undertaking a dedicated research project into SaaS and Field Service. The survey itself is intelligently designed to ask only the questions relevant to you specifically and will therefore take you no less than two minutes to complete.

We will be using this data to compile an exclusive white paper based on the results which will be sent to all respondents before it is published to the general public. Also as a means of thanking you for taking the time to give us you insight we are offering three £50(or local equivalent) Amazon vouchers which are provided by our partner in this project Tesseract Software. The winners of these vouchers will be picked at random when the survey closes.

So why not take two minutes out of your day, help us understand the industry better and give yourself a chance to win! Take the survey here

Field Service News is pleased to bring you the first in our new monthly series of podcasts. In this first instalment we speak to Colin Brown Managing Director of  Tesseract Software. We ask Colin how the industry has changed since he first started Tesseract over a quarter of a century ago, how service management software has evolved and how the needs of service managers has changed dramatically over time as well.

With Tesseract having been one of the first Field Service companies to fully embrace a SaaS solution we also take the opportunity to put some big questions about the suitability of the cloud for field service software to him, including:

• Is the cloud/SaaS secure enough?
• How can I make sure that this new SaaS provider is legitimate?
• What about areas where there is no mobile internet?
• Is SaaS suitable for all types of company?

To hear the full interview and see how colin responds to these questions plus many more click the button below and complete the brief registration to download the podcast for free!

Download the full podcast now!

TerraXML, an enterprise software and services provider, have announced the 2014 release of the TerraView, a collaborative content delivery platform which could be of great interest to those operating in the field service arena.

The new release promises a wide range of freshly incorporated features that are designed to both improve remote access to information as well as simplifying the administration process. TerraXML claim that not only will TerraView 2014 offer considerable additional benefits for customers already using the TerraView platform – but also widen the platforms usability to industries that operate outside of networked environments

Bob Aidun, TerraXML CEO states that “TerraView 2014 represents a significant advancement in digital content delivery,”

Aidun further added "While there is already considerable alignment with cloud and mobile technology in the industries we serve, the adoption of these solutions is inherently tied to online connectivity. However, the need to be continuously connected prohibits the use of digital content in operating environments where internet service is unavailable or inconsistent. With this release, TerraView users are now able to freely access mission-critical information both online and offline. This brings considerable value to our customers who have historically struggled with providing disconnected field teams with up-to-date information.”

It is the ability to continue to access vital information in an offline environment that could potentially makes this release of interest to companies with a remote or mobile workforce. Whilst the move to digital, cloud based mobile solutions have in no doubt revolutionised the way field service organisations operate, the one consistent issue remains - what if there is no internet signal to connect to?

Whilst a number of solutions provide the ability to access information online, connectivity issues still remain for a large number of mobile solutions. Therefore the ability for field service engineers to access essential information onsite is an important element in improving first time fix rates and overall efficiency. A consistent aim for most field service companies.

Another neat benefit in addition to boasting strong support of offline data access, is that TerraView 2014 can manage data across multiple distributed servers to ensure updates to end user devices are performed using the absolute most current information - regardless of geographical location. Again a major advantage for mobile teams based in various locations such as aviation field service engineers for example, where a team may be tracking a specific flight internationally.

If TerraView 2014 is able to further improve upon the ability for field service engineers to access this key information whenever and wherever it is needed  as it claims then it is certainly a worthy release worth further inspection. Particularly for those industries that have widespread teams due to the nature of their industries such as aviation and many other field service industries.

Gain a mobile edge

To get maximum value from your enterprise asset management (EAM) solution, your technicians need full access to your system anyplace, any time. Of course, some tasks can be completed while sitting at a desk,but some of the most important and valuable asset management tasks need to be done in the field, where many critical assets are located. Mobile access to EAM gives your maintenance and asset management professionals the information they need where they need it the most—at the point of performance.

Infor™ EAM customers can now get easy mobile access on the Apple™ iPad® platform to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of asset management personnel who work in the field with Infor EAM Mobile for iPad.

Empower field service

Infor EAM Mobile for iPad extends the value of Infor EAM to field service workers, as well as to managers,clerks, and schedulers who are connected directly to the solution. Technicians working remotely get the functions they need to access, capture, and manage information from the job site.

You’ll improve accuracy, deliver better service, and manage assets more efficiently when your field service team can record as they work rather than waiting to document work after the fact. Infor EAM Mobile for iPad enriches the communications link between the field and the office, so that you and your field service workers can assign, perform, and record activities and ad hoc work orders from the work site, anytime, anywhere.

Streamline asset management using your iPad The popularity and effortless usability of the iPad means even the most inexperienced user gets quick, simple access to all necessary information from your Infor EAM system. Because Infor EAM Mobile for iPad is a standards-based solution, you can implement it straight out of the box or easily configure it to meet every user’s unique requirements. And by relying on the iPad for access, you’re not constrained to the costs and limitations of proprietary hardware solutions.

The rich functionality of Infor EAM Mobile for iPad delivers:

Work order management: Users can download work orders directly from the database and then assign or re-assign those work orders to the appropriate individual. Infor EAM Mobile users can view their assigned activities and access work order history and asset information to facilitate diagnosis and repair. They can also issue and return parts, book labor hours, view documents, and add images to the work order for future reference. Users can create personalized to-do lists that include the specific details for a task. When workers have completed the task, they can close the order, include comments and closing codes, and even upload pictures. With Infor EAM Mobile for iPad, it’s simple to book and capture labor information accurately using start, stop, and pause controls, and you can print work order reports just as easily.

Improved usability: Using the iPad’s FaceTime™ video conferencing app, workers in the field can consult directly with workers in other locations to solve issues quickly. Workers can use iPad mapping software to view exactly where assets are located and find driving directions.

21 CFR 11 support: To simplify compliance with government regulations such as 21CFR 11, Infor EAM Mobile delivers record-locking and electronic signature capabilities using the iPad. You can remotely conduct validations, change work order status, obtain electronic signatures, and run authentications.

Asset tracking: Workers can view all equipment on a map, consult the full history of the equipment, and see all relevant documents. Infor EAM Mobile for iPad also supports the Infor EAM asset inventory process.

Inspections: Users get a list of inspection points, which improves the overall efficiency and thoroughness of the inspection process. After completing the inspection, mobile users can enter the results into Infor EAM Mobile for iPad’s inspection result-entry lines.

Configuration: Administrators can create, configure, and consolidate prompts for simplified deployment and reduced support costs. Screens can be configured by hiding and arranging fields, making certain fields mandatory, and setting up default values. Unique user profiles identify what data to synchronize to a specific handheld device, which equipment to include, what and how much history to store, and numerous other  import and security rules.

Business-specific mobile processes: You get the tools to create new business-specific mobile processes to support your unique business requirements. You can create processes from within the Infor EAM environment, then configure and deploy those processes to the mobile device for immediate use by the field workforce.

Synchronization: You get support for two-way, real-time exchange of data between mobile devices and the central Infor EAM database. Each time a user transmits data from an iPad to the database, the entire system is updated and a return transmission updates the data on the handheld device.

Because Infor EAM Mobile for iPad is an Infor solution, every time a change is made to your core EAM solution, that change is automatically added to your mobile solution—no middleware is required.

Build productivity

Infor EAM Mobile for iPad delivers a state-of-the-art, cost-effective, mobile computing infrastructure on an easy to use consumer device. With Infor EAM Mobile for iPad, you can:

• Allow mobile workers to record as they work, rather than recording work after the fact
• Automate work order tasks and requests for labor, saving up to 20% on associated labor cost
• Improve response time and avoid unnecessary travel

As a result, you get better decision-making and productivity in the field, and a quick return on investment.

By implementing an advanced scheduling system and mobility technology from ClickSoftware, Carglass improves customer service and speed of on-location repairs and replacements

Servicing eight hundred thousand customers every year, Carglass, the leading vehicle glass repair and replacement company in Germany, relies on its branch and mobile technicians to provide top-notch service to its customers. Carglass has selected ClickSoftware’s mobile service optimisation suite to automate the scheduling of appointments and the resource management of technicians, enabling the company to quickly service customers on-location, resulting in faster, more efficient customer care.

After observing the fast and successful deployment of ClickSoftware’s solution at Belron in the UK, Carglass decided to roll out the scheduling system in Germany.

“We are always focused on improving our customers’ experience. By optimising our scheduling system with ClickSoftware, we will be able to better assign our technicians to remote job requests quickly and efficiently, saving our customers’ time, gas, money and frustration. Rather than our customers having to drive to one of our Service Centers, we are now able to send a mobile technician to their specific location,” said Ronald Hoff, Project Manager Operations at Carglass GmbH. “The ClickSoftware solution streamlines this process and the benefits will be realised from the business side down to the customers’ experience. Most importantly, we will be able to roll it out to technicians quickly to reap the benefits.”

In the old model, schedulers used manual charts to assign mobile technicians their job assignments each day. ClickSoftware’s established service chain optimisation algorithms will now allow Carglass to streamline business processes across its mobile technicians. If Carglass receives a request for an on-location repair, the scheduler can assign that job instantly to the mobile technician best suited for job requirements. If a second on-location repair request comes in, the scheduler can prompt that same mobile technician to next complete this new job or assign it to another mobile technician who may be closer to the location or have a more appropriate skillset. Concurrently, branch technicians at the Service Centers continue to service customers who need their cars fixed.

“The improved customer service that Carglass will now be able to provide by automating and optimising the scheduling system is significant and an important factor in keeping a competitive edge,” said Dr. Moshe BenBassat, Founder and CEO of ClickSoftware. “By matching individual mobile technician’s skills and location, Carglass will be able to increase the speed and number of mobile requests. We look forward to continuing to build our relationship with Carglass and Belron.”

Gamestec, the largest gaming and amusement machine operator in the UK, provides services for over 35,000 machines in 10,500 locations. With many decades’ of experience, the company prides itself on the level of service it offers its customers which include pubs, leisure venues, clubs, bars and service stations. They provide an end to end solution for the operation of the gaming system with 364 days per year customer care facility and over 1000 field based teams to ensure local experts are on hand.

Managing field workers and field service

As part of their commitment to customer care, Gamestec embarked on a project to replace their legacy Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system and improve customer service levels. Having evaluated many CRM options they chose to work with mplsystems to introduce a pioneering solution, utilising mplsystems’ iMobile technology that would not only provide a CRM solution but would also offer call and email handling, manage bookings and engineering visits and provide visibility of, and communications with, field workers.

The solution

Working with mplsystems, Gamestec devised a solution that was unique in that it collapses the service desk, planning and dispatch functions into a single ‘intelligent’ agent desktop, thereby enabling the contact centre to communicate directly with engineers’ smart phones. The desktop integrates Gamestec’s asset management; ordering and stock control systems and provides a mobile workforce management tool. iMobile smart phone app allows the company’s in-house contact centre to communicate directly with engineers’ PDAs, automatically allocating jobs according to the engineers’ skill, location and current workload. Should emergency appointments come up or clients change their bookings, schedules are dynamically optimised based on field engineers’ current locations and loading and real time updates sent to the appropriate engineer.

Agent Experience

The custom agent desktop is designed to provide a single view of everything that the agent needs to resolve Gamestec client requests. It provides the agent with a complete view of the client’s service history, specific assets, locations as well as managing service bookings and schedules. This integrated approach has allowed Gamestec to change the way customer service is managed; previously, all service requests were passed through a number of separate departments, opening up the opportunity for errors and delays. The new desktop solution brings these teams into a cross-functional role covering help desk, customer service and planning. Now, requests are dealt with by one person who dispatches the request immediately out to the field. This real time view, along with other process improvements, has enabled service response times to decrease by 28%, or 44 minutes over the 12 months.

Customer Experience

Providing real time customer updates: when a customer calls to check the progress of, or change to, a service request, the agent can provide an immediate update from a live map on their desktop showing in real time all engineers’ locations (via GPS), their skill sets and current loading.

End-to-end service request reporting improves customer satisfaction: management is provided with real time monitoring of service requests, escalations and SLA adherence. Using hour by hour and day by day reports, aged issues can be captured quickly, escalation effectively managed and communicated to both field staff and customers advising them of completion timescales.

Business benefits

Prior to the iMobile deployment, Gamestec had needed separate contact centre technology, CRM and handheld devices to maintain communications with engineers. These systems required multiple licenses and were expensive to maintain and support and were proving to be inflexible. By deploying the new solution to cover all 3 functional areas, Gamestec has experienced an 88% reduction in on-going IT costs and has enabled increased efficiency across the organisation in how service and field workers are deployed.

With a fully integrated product across the two companies customers are set to benefit from one integrated contact centre solution based on Intelecom Connect and Verint Impact 360 workforce management Software. The offering is available in one flexible cloud-based deployment model.

Intelecom Group AS, a provider of cloud contact centre technology, have announced the availability of  Verint Systems's Impact 360 workforce management and optimisation software as a cloud-based solution integrated into Intelecom Connect. This follows the organisations commencing their relationship earlier this year in May 2013 and is impressive in the speed at which they have ben able to collaborate as well as the depth of the proposition. Adding to Intelcom's contact solution, Verint are prominently placed in a field they define as "Actionable Intelligence" solutions and their product line already includes a suite of award-winning workforce optimisation software as well as an analytics tool Voice of Customer Analytics.

The closer alignment of service to other divisions within an organisation is one that is often cited as a critical steep in moving from cost centre to profit centre, or at the very least in increasing efficiency and reducing costs simultaneously. Of course one of the most obvious and simplest divisions for alignment to the service centre in in many cases is the contact centre as often they fulfil many similar if not overlapping functions.

An integrated, cloud-based solution will help multi-site, multichannel contact centres capture a full range of customer interactions for quality, compliance and customer intelligence that can be used to enhance operations, improve performance and heighten the customer experience. It also opens the doors wide to operational transparency which is key to the successful operation of an efficient service division.

When we then add in the more standard service management-esque elemeents to the solution which can help organisations automate workforce management, including staff forecasting and scheduling, and the ability to track agent adherence, while providing performance management we are starting to see yet another example of the more holistic platform approach to software that Sergio Barata referred to in his recent feature .

Torkel Engeness, CEO of Intelecom comments, “An increasing number of our customers using our cloud-based contact centre are placing more focus on enhancing the customer experience. There are clear benefits in using a robust and well-known workforce optimisation technology, deployed in the same flexible cloud model as our core product. Verint, with its proven portfolio of WFO and VoC Analytics solutions, makes it an ideal partner for Intelecom.”

Nick Nonini, Senior Vice President Sales, Verint Enterprise Intelligence Solutions^™adds, “Verint is committed to working with select partners to deliver our portfolio of solutions in the cloud. Our customers and the industry at-large continue to recognise Verint as the market leader and innovator in deploying WFO applications in a variety of environments, from on-premises to the cloud. With this partnership, Intelecom’s customers have access to a fully-integrated, cloud-based WFO solution.”

Intelecom Connect is at the time of writing as close as any other offering to being the complete contact centre solution available in the cloud.  Of course the fact that it follows the SaaS model also provides a number of other benefits including being affordable to those companies for whom such technology may previously been prohibitively expensive to obtain.

The flexibility of the Connect application programming interface and Web Services allows seamless integration into third-party software environments. This partnership not only provides Intelecom customers with advanced workforce management technology typically associated with on-premise licensing, but also makes it available on an integrated in-the-cloud, pay-as-you-use basis from a single supplier. Offering customers flexibility in deployment, it also can help them meet their business requirements as they evolve.

Verint’s Impact 360 Workforce Optimisation suite enables organisations to capture, analyse and act on customer, business and market intelligence, and gain a complete multichannel view of customer interactions and experiences. Again the type of technology at the top of a lot of field service managers wish lists currently.

Using tools like this companies can identify opportunities to refine and enhance products and services; maximise information and workflow across functions; learn about competitive and other changing market dynamics; fine-tune internal business processes; enhance staff sales/service delivery; reduce operating costs; and realise new revenue opportunities. All extremely commendable in its own right.

Brought together these options certainly make for a compelling package and it's good to see such strong collaboration yielding impressive initial results.

ALS Environmental has selected Paragon routing and scheduling software to plan collections and deliveries of water, earth and air samples for testing at its specialist laboratories. The analytical services company has installed Paragon's Multi Depot software at its Coventry headquarters for optimising the transport of hundreds of samples a week using its fleet of 3.5 tonne temperature controlled vehicles.

Paragon's routing and scheduling software enables ALS Environmental to plan the routes for all its vehicles and drivers centrally across all the company's depots as a single planning task. The software adjusts depot boundaries dynamically to ensure calls are routed from the most suitable depot according to fleet availability and the geographic spread of orders on the day.

"Paragon enables me to plan all our collections and deliveries across the UK quickly and efficiently so it is a critical part of our operation. Without the software it would take hours to plan the routes and we wouldn't be able to provide the high level of service we offer our customers. We import all the jobs directly into Paragon and then the routes and schedules are generated automatically. We print the routes for our drivers directly from the system, so there is no further data entry to do," says Shaun Millington, Transport Controller, ALS Environmental.

ALS Environmental is part of the ALS group - one of the world's largest and most diversified analytical testing service providers operating across 55 countries. The company is one of the UK's leading providers in its field that offers an extensive range of accredited analytical services for water, land and waste monitoring. The company provides its customers with accurate, legally defensible, analytical data.