When working in the field to a demanding schedule a paperless workflow is needed to avoid the time and inefficiency associated with having to get job sheets to remote engineers and then re-keying the information.
The Remote Field Service Application is a mobile phone or tablet based application that runs on each of the major mobile operating systems, and allows field service engineers to work without paper.
The field service engineer is able to download his work for the near future at any time, with the exact number of days depending on how the master system is setup. Should there be any completed work, the details of that work will be automatically sent back before new work is downloaded.
A highly efficient transfer protocol is used to ensure the exchange of data is a speedy process, and this, together with its well thought-through user interface and ease of use makes it very popular with engineers.
The engineer can easily see a brief overview of each job, when the job is booked for and the time allowed for completion. Tapping on the job reveals full details of both the job and the site to be visited.
If the job involves servicing or testing of assets that can be at multiple locations in the building or on the site, then the Remote Field Service Application will know the location of each asset.
In this case the engineer has a choice, he can let the application guide him from asset to asset or he can specify where he is and the application will show just the assets in that location.
Assets can also be bar coded if required and scanning the barcode for an asset will identify it as well as what, if any, work is needed on that asset.
All jobs will have at least one task that needs to be carried out, and some many different tasks. For each task a detailed description is supplied explaining exactly how to conduct that task, which is really helpful for new engineers and where sub-contract labour needs to be used.
For each task, the engineer is able to engineer is able to say when it has been completed and supply detailed information in support of that. Tasks can also be set to ask multiple choice questions, or require a specific and precise measurement to be taken, which is entered directly and then validated in real time.
If the mobile or tablet device has a camera, photographs can also be taken and captured to provide supporting evidence.
The results and other details from the various tasks that make up each job can be sent back at any time there is sufficient coverage to enable a connection to the central server infrastructure.
As soon as the results have been submitted, they are immediately processed and made available in the associated web application. This means the staff managing the field service engineers can deal with any issues arising from the work done and can invoice it if necessary.
It is also possible for alerts to be automatically sent to the relevant people so they can be instantly notified or completion and any issues that have arisen. PDF job sheets are also automatically created that can be e-mailed to the customer.
The description above only gives a brief overview of what the Remote Field Service Application can do. This mobile application is designed to be combined with the Job Allocation & Control system or with the powerful aquaAdept or assetAdept asset management systems to work in a seamless, holistic way.
The application is used by household name facilities management companies and many field servicing and contracting companies of all sizes.
