The Problems with Traditional Field Service Operations

Many companies still perform this critical field service operations as it has been done for many years—printed work orders, phoned instructions, paperwork turned in at the end of the day, data entered in desktop computers, and customer invoices sent through the mail. But manually handling and inputting information hinders the efficiency and accuracy that managers value. 

Time is Wasted 

When done in the traditional, manual way, allocating person hours becomes a bottleneck, slowing the process down to what the service provider can reasonably expect. The result is that the information you’re looking at now is never current—it’s from days or even weeks ago. How will that help you make smart, proactive decisions about what field technicians should do now, let alone how to direct their next move? This leads not only to inefficiencies, but also to missed opportunities. 

Becomes Costly Over Time 

The speed issue can, of course, be addressed by hiring additional personnel and /or temporary contractors. But that points to the first hazard of manually aligning field work with the back office. This approach makes your budget work against you, pitting the need to move quickly against the need to control costs. Furthermore, all the extra visits required because of low first-time fix rates will increase travel time and lead to higher costs than if you took a more streamlined, technology-driven approach to field service processes. 

Ensuring Regulatory Compliance is Difficult 

There’s incredible complexity in the ever-changing regulatory landscape, and because of the public’s desire for transparency, compliance will play an increasingly critical role in field service operations. When taking a traditional approach to aligning field work with the back office, audits are highly time- and resource-intensive, which circles back to our first two hazards. (And the more countries in which your company operates, the more hazardous a manual approach becomes to the health and vitality of your operation.) 

Benefits of Field Service Automation 

Fortunately, field service management technology is available to avoid these pitfalls. Built to integrate into any CRM solution, this technology promotes faster, more accurate operations by sharing information across all departments within the business. Additionally, it drives cost savings by minimizing service hours and improves auditability with fast and intuitive reporting

With Gomocha’s technology solutions, organizations in the field service industry will develop ever more efficient service-to-cash cycles. View our solutions to get started simplifying and streamlining your business’s operations.