Category: BigChange News

Traditionally, job management was symbolised by three things: a pencil, a sheet of paper, and T-cards. 

However, as technology and customer expectations evolve, field service businesses are making the move to job management software. 

In this blog, we’ll walk you through seven ways to improve job management in 2023. 

But first, let’s get into why improving job management is so important for field service businesses. 

Challenges of field service management

Efficient, seamless, and quality field service management isn’t always easy. Aspects that negatively affect the customer experience include:

• Long waiting times
• Poor customer communication
• Lack of information for field service engineers

As well as leading to unhappy customers, these challenges can also increase the need for costly return visits and leave your team feeling stressed. 

The global pandemic has changed field service management for many organisations. We’re seeing a spike in businesses adopting new solutions to improve job management and future-proof their businesses. 

So, how do you keep customers happy, and help field engineers perform at their best? Below, we outline our top seven tips.

7 ways field service teams can improve job management in 2023

The first step to update your approach to job management is to go digital with the right job management software. 

In short, the primary purpose of job management software is to assist field service businesses to run a more efficient and profitable business. 

In this respect, job management platforms have numerous advantages. 

Uniting job scheduling, resource management, team collaboration, finance and billing, job tracking and reporting, you can quickly and easily manage projects from quote to invoice. 

Here’s the top seven ways to improve job management in 2023 and a walkthrough of each benefit individually:

Route engineers more efficiently 

With pump prices at an 18-year high and not set to significantly fall anytime soon, fuel costs can quickly run up the bill. 

That’s why it’s in your best interest to ensure engineers take the fastest and shortest routes to site. The right job management platform can map the most efficient route to reduce travel time.

Job management software solutions can also help you to react faster to urgent jobs by finding the nearest resource to a specific location. Real-time updates also let you know when a worker finishes a job and can take on a new job. 

Keep on schedule

In the past, customers were happy enough to wait hours or days for an engineer or piece of equipment to arrive. Today’s customers expect you to value their time – which means you can’t leave scheduling to chance. 

Modern job management tools ensure you assign the right engineer, resources, and parts to the right job – all while keeping your customers fully informed. Likewise, keeping track of vehicles can help with maintaining your fleet. 

Gain real-time information 

Real-time information is helpful for all involved in a field service job, from engineers, to finance, and, of course, the end customer. 

For example, an increasing number of consumers want to see modern technology with ‘Amazon-type’ features like real-time updates, the engineer’s location, and two-way communication. 

It also acts as a real-time link between the office and the fieldworker, meaning that you can send images and documents with a customer on-site. Plus, it allows job cards to be sent immediately after the job is completed.

Optimise resource management 

Good resource management can help make significant savings with the costs of machinery and vehicles. 

In contrast, increased downtime and inefficient use of assets eats into profit margins. 

But by tracking assets, you can fully optimise their use, whether it’s ensuring that vehicles are regularly serviced or that certification and industry credentials are kept up to date. In fact, 96% of companies that use fleet tracking find it beneficial and users reported a positive return on investment six months after implementation. 

Job management tools also reduce the need to have more than one engineer on-site to solve an issue. Through cloud storage, engineers can access previous service history and vital documents to perform tasks better.

Improve time management

Historically, managers have had a hard time managing field service teams and monitoring the quality and punctuality of their work.

With the right software and improved scheduling tools, you can cut admin time by 60-70% – and view precise locations and whether the job started on time via job tracking.

You can make job and resource allocations faster and make it easy for all employees to know what to do, when, and where. 

Reduce manual work

Manually keying in work orders, customer information and tasks to separate systems takes time and is prone to human-error. 

Instead, your workflows could be automated and integrated. 

Plus, not only can job management be automated, but also reports, certificates, and customer documents can be created automatically. 

Improve cash flow

In today’s day and age, it’s more important than ever to keep tight control of the financial reins, whether via excellent reporting or tighter control of stock and preventative maintenance scheduling.

The good news is, financial documents can be created straight from a job’s information, resulting in improved cash flow – and no un-invoiced jobs.  

The future is digital

Businesses across all industries are undergoing digital transformation, and a similar process is underway for field service management businesses. 

Every day, we’re seeing more and more field service businesses make the switch from traditional manual methods and legacy systems to more modern integrated job management platforms. 

Whether you’re in the market for job management software or are looking to make the switch to a complete end-to-end solution, the team at BigChange is here to help. 

In short, digital job management solutions can have an immediate effect on your profitability, efficiency, and customer experience. 

Field service businesses, large and small, juggle many jobs, tasks, and people. Having the right solution keeps everything and everyone organised and able to run jobs in a way that is accurate, efficient, and profitable. 

The benefits that the right job management software brings are boundless.

In fact, field service management software is probably the single most useful tool in making you more competitive and setting you apart from the rest of your industry.

How BigChange provides a strong competitive advantage 

At BigChange, it’s our mission to make our customers successful by accelerating growth and sustainability in our community. 

In fact, our approach is revolutionising an under-resourced but critical part of the UK economy. For the first time, these businesses can be truly scalable. 

We’ve even won awards for it. 

We are extremely proud to celebrate winning The Business Enabler of the Year at the Lloyds Bank British Business Excellence Awards, the UK’s most prestigious national awards honouring the innovation, success, and resilience of British business. (And we are proud to be the first job management software company to do so.)

Why did we win this award? The win recognises our contribution to helping SME field service businesses transform operational efficiency, productivity, and customer service – and for using our position to promote best practice, safer driving, and compliance with field teams.

Speaking of best practice, in this blog, we’ll walk you through seven examples of how we’re helping BigChange customers to gain a competitive advantage, starting with one of the key benefits of job management software – effortless scheduling. 

Example #1: Effortless Scheduling

Intelligent scheduling allows customers to schedule jobs, see if resources are on schedule, and send and receive automated messaging.

By the same token, not only can customers schedule and reschedule jobs quickly and easily, but so too can field service engineers. 

Take MEDLEC, for example. The electrical contractor boosted worker productivity by 40% thanks to engineers being able to self-allocate jobs.  

“As jobs come in, they are instantly available to our engineers. It means we can be more reactive and efficient with our time, therefore we’re around 40% more productive, allowing us to take on more work with the same resources.”

If you haven’t considered job management software before, you can see how easy it is to schedule a job below.

You can simply drag and drop a job onto the schedule – and send it straight to your mobile workforce.

Example #2: Paperless Operations

It goes without saying, going paperless is one of the hallmarks of a good job management process. 

You can’t gain efficiencies when you spend so much time double-keying the same information into several systems, writing up job sheets, and using T-cards.

Going digital reduces admin time, plus overall job time – and human error. 

With all your key information stored digitally, your team can access it from anywhere in an instant. The increased efficiency will mean you get more work done – with the same amount of people. 

It’s good for the planet too. 🌍

Look for an all-in-one cloud-based solution that can link up with Sage 50, Xero and more. 

But don’t just take it from us, see what plumbing and heating firm, Celsius, said: 

“The new link between BigChange & Xero is now seamless and instant no delays. We only have to enter data once and that cuts hours off our admin time. Now anyone can raise an invoice we don’t have to rely solely on the accounts team. This system automation will allow us to grow without increasing our back office headcount.”

Example #3: Easy To Use Mobile App

Even those with job management software in place can fall short without a mobile app. 

Your workforce is mainly on the road, so it’s critical they have everything they need on the go.

 A mobile app reduces job time, improves first-time fix rates, and more. Specifically, jobs can be sent to field workers in real-time allowing for urgent changes to happen instantly. 

In fact, everything you want your field workers to have can be made available on a customer-by-customer basis, from site maps to manuals, forms and worksheets.

What makes BigChange the best job management software for many clients is its integration with vehicle and job tracking. This allows vehicle locations to be displayed on a secure, web-based mapping system. This real-time tracking provides instant visibility of technicians, as well as traffic conditions – reducing customer wait times and travel costs and emissions.

Talking about the solution, Danny Fuller, Operations Director, at LDF said:

BigChange handles our job management brilliantly, linking site history, alerts and client access rules seamlessly,” he continued. “The function for multiday work, grouped jobs and the allocation of purchase orders is also fantastic and being able to link multiple teams, and multiple jobs to the same address has been a godsend.”

BigChange is also saving LDF customers time and money, evidenced by 86% of its business coming from repeat customers.  

Example #4: Accurate Job Tracking

Accurate tracking means complete visibility of your field based teams, vehicles, and assets with real-time updates.

Knowing exactly where your field workers are at all times, means you can reroute them if necessary or divert them to pick-up van stock from the nearest supplier or colleague.

You can also plan and reduce fuel costs with smart routing between jobs. 

These efficiencies can translate into big profits, as illustrated by J W Hinchcliffe (Tanks):

“Since we went live with BigChange around 2 years ago, we have increased our turnover by around 35 per cent. “BigChange has freed up my time to run the business rather than it running me. This has allowed me to invest time in other areas of the business, such as the website, advertising and customer care, which has undoubtedly contributed to our growth.”

Example #5: Robust CRM Database

In today’s world, how you manage customers matters. 

With a CRM system built for field service businesses, you can improve customer satisfaction through instant communication. Customers can log into a customer portal, track job progress, leave feedback, and directly communicate with your business. 

Plus, field service operations become easier to manage. With full customer history, you can send reminders for recurring jobs, such as servicing of machinery and scheduled PPM (planned preventative maintenance). And you can also see full financial history with a customer as well as associated images, attachments, and contracts. 

Of course, the real value of a CRM comes when it is integrated with your job management software. 

As an example, before BigChange, Omnia Plumbing used a standalone diary system, separate accounting software, and no CRM – which meant countless phone calls and lots of wasted time. Talking about the switch to BigChange, Omnia’s owner, Alastair Barton said:

“Since implementing BigChange, our customer interaction has vastly improved with automated ETAs and updates, and project-specific information available wherever and whenever it’s needed. The vehicle tracking also means we never miss billing a job which saves us literally tens of thousands of pounds every year!”

Example #6: Strong Network and Partnership

Another way to gain competitive advantage is through a strong network and partnerships. 

In a nutshell, a strong network allows you to offer yourself as a contractor/subcontractor or look for contractors/subcontractors safe in the knowledge they are trustworthy partners. 

At BigChange, we are huge advocates of a partnership approach. We even have an entire team dedicated to it. 

The BigChange “Network” provides the ideal platform for collaboration between customers. 

To see how it works in practice, watch our overview video, below.

Example #7: Critical Business Intelligence

When evaluating job management software, it’s easy to focus on ease of job scheduling, and all those other important elements to improve efficiencies. While all of this is important, we sometimes forget to consider business information. 

Access to business intelligence insights can highlight opportunities to not only improve efficiency but also forecast cash flow management. 

With ‘at-a-glance’ dashboards, you gain improved insight into your business. You can set-up KPIs and track job completion stages, financial reports with details on work in progress, and much more. 

It’s so important that everybody, from engineers to back-office staff have access to the right information, as Adam Redgwick, from Warmaway, points out:

“The engineers know in advance what their day looks like and they know they have the information they need to deal with each and every job. With BigChange, even the back-office staff know they have the tools they need to get the job done from scheduling to keeping the customers informed and managing cash flow.”

Award-winning field service business: NWCE 

What’s even better than winning awards ourselves is seeing our clients win them.

NWCE Foodservice Equipment has recently won a Catering Insight award in the category Distributor of the Year Digital Initiative.

Powered by BigChange, the food service equipment company is now able to save 31.4 miles in a day, saving roughly 31 minutes of driving time with live traffic forecasting.

This converts to a massive reduction of 1.5 tons of CO₂ per van, per year!

See for yourself👇

Gain competitive advantage with BigChange

As you plan for next year, take the time to consider what’s best for your field service business and how you can maximise efficiencies and improve cash flow to scale and grow. 

If we have you convinced that job management software is the way to do it, start here with a demo to find out if BigChange could work for you. 

Tech company signs £14m worth of new contracts across multiple sectors, including specialist cleaning, telecommunications, building services, property maintenance, plumbing and heating

BigChange, the field-service management software company, announced today that it signed almost 200 new customers and £14m worth of new contracts in the first half of 2022. This was the company’s most successful half-year of sales in its ten-year history.

In addition to strong growth in the UK, BigChange secured its first customer in Canada and expanded its international presence across France, Cyprus and Australia to more than 200 customers. The company’s new customers come from various sectors, including cleaning services, telecommunications, building services, property maintenance, plumbing, and heating.

BigChange’s job management platform, which enables small and medium-sized businesses to digitise paper processes, streamline field-service operations and improve customer service, is now used by 1,900 organisations worldwide.

More than 200 BigChange customers joined the BigChange Network in the first half of 2022, making it easier for them to collaborate on jobs, find subcontractors and manage work done by partners.

Richard Warley, Chief Executive Officer at BigChange, comments:

“2022 has been a terrific year so far for BigChange, and, most importantly, it has also been a great year for our customer-base who are continuing to show amazing levels of growth.

Against a backdrop of economic uncertainty, we are continuing to invest heavily in our software and customer support to continue to give our customers the edge that they need to be successful for the remainder of 2022 and beyond.“

Richard Warley, CEO BigChange