Promote Good Communication and Information
Maintain a consistent, high standard across your team around capturing accurate client details, job descriptions, diary notes, client notes and special job requirements. When it comes to field service operations, good team communication is essential, and poor information or minor omissions can compound into significant inefficiencies. Being unprepared for a job due to not having the required parts, equipment, or experience, and multiple site visits, visits back and forth to your office/warehouse/suppliers, or even time wasted travelling to the wrong site, all cost your business in billable time & labour.- Always take the time to match a job address to its corresponding geocoded location suggested in the job card when saving new jobs in the App or Online Dashboard. Assuring the quality of the job location is accurate is important, because ServiceM8 displays this location in the map interfaces, takes the location into account when suggesting booking times/staff, and it’s ultimately where the relevant staff member will navigate to on the day of the booking. A simple matter of entering a vague or incorrect job address can cause delays, schedule disruption, and customer dissatisfaction.
- Use Checklists when entering job descriptions, either in the ServiceM8 app or Online Dashboard i.e. add a dash (-) on a new line in the Job Description field to make a Checklist requirement. This breaks the job down into clear, actionable requirements which instil process and quality assurance into job completion.
- Use Job Badges or Staff Tagging (e.g. @John — this job requires welding) where a job requires special parts or equipment. If parts or equipment need to be hired or picked up, assign a Task to a team member against the relevant job.
- Use Job Templates to save time, systemise, and instil consistency and quality into jobs across the business. Job templates make it easy for staff members to create a job without leaving important information out. It’s also a powerful training, quality assurance, profitability and time-saving tool to systemise the creation, completion & billing of common jobs your business does.
Stock Up on Most-Used Materials
Check out the Materials Usage Report — an on-demand report available in the Reports tab of your Online Dashboard, the Materials Usage Report shows the most-used Materials & Services across your jobs over a specified date range, and can be additionally segmented by individual staff members and Job Categories. Generate and use this report to ensure vehicles are always well-stocked with your most-used items. Learn more.Capture Business Knowledge
The Knowledge Add-on can help maintain and improve your team’s efficiency, quality of work, customer service, and instil the essence of what sets your business apart. This happens through systemisation and empowering your staff with knowledge which is organised, accessible wherever they are, and available just when they need it. With the ability to record videos & articles in your ServiceM8 account, you can capture and share:- Procedures for specific types of jobs
- ‘How To’ instructions for specific tasks or problems
- Expertise & Know-how which set your business apart
- Tips, Tricks & Traps of the trade which could save a junior staff member hours on a job
- Policies & Guidelines for dealing with certain scenarios
- Best-Practice Examples to demonstrate the standard of quality & service expected
- Client-specific info such as Service Level Agreements or non-standard processes
Investing the time to capture your business knowledge can improve your First Time Fix Rate because it helps with:
- Staff independence & capability
- Knowledge sharing between senior and junior team members
- Minimising interrupting phone calls to senior staff
- Avoiding the need to answer the same question or teach something, over and over
- Improving job completion & reducing return visits or call-backs
- Promoting a consistent standard of quality & customer service
- Proactively learning from past mistakes
- Making information accessible to staff “just in time”, wherever they are