For any service contractor, scheduling can make or break your business. But for HVAC businesses, optimizing your team is even more important. Getting to your customers quickly can mean the difference between having a new loyal fan or a disgruntled customer who could harm your business with bad word of mouth. While general scheduling packages exist, HVAC scheduling software can optimize your schedule and bring tremendous results.
About FieldPulse
FieldPulse’s HVAC software allows you to manage your HVAC business in the office or on-the-go. It manages scheduling, estimates and invoices, team communication, team tracking, timesheets, customers, and more. FieldPulse offers a unique tool for sharing job information with your team, allowing you to decide how you want to view your information about jobs, technician availability, and more.
All the elements you need from business management software are built-in: integration with QuickBooks, invoicing and estimating, mobile payment capability, photos and file attachment, GPS tracking, time tracking, and customer management. Now to the ways HVAC scheduling software can help you maximize your business.
Share Job Information for Better Communication
Using HVAC scheduling software, your technicians arrive at the job with all of the information, and capabilities, they need to work in a paperless environment. They can quickly pull up the customer record and see job notes, customer history, and more.
This gives the technician all of the necessary details to get started on the work right away.Status updates keep you informed as to when (and where) your employees clocked in and out, completed jobs, and began transit to the next one. Real time communication keeps you connected with your team in the field.
Notify Your Team of New Jobs Automatically
Calls come in all day, every day – and many need immediate attention. When you schedule an appointment you no longer need to call someone in the field, relay the information by phone, and hope to get an update when they arrive. Instead, appointment scheduling software allows you to capture notes on the call and immediately schedule the job. Once the job is assigned by the employee scheduler, a notification in the mobile app alerts the technician to the new job.
Like any other scheduled job, they have access to all of the notes and customer information they need to walk in the door prepared. From the customer’s perspective, the technician knows as much about their needs on this emergency service visit as if it was a planned maintenance visit scheduled weeks in advance.
Make Scheduling and Dispatching Easier
When managing a paper schedule, you only have one view at a time. With HVAC scheduling software like FieldPulse, availability gaps can be viewed in a number of ways, including calendar views and Gantt charts. Trying to fit someone into a busy schedule? The Gantt view works great. A quick visual glance tells you which technicians are available at which time – and who is fully booked. Save time with a scheduling tool by looking at your entire team, or groups of teams, all at once instead of trying to compare each individual’s schedule.
You can seamlessly stay on top of who’s clocked out and who’s still available for last minute jobs. And with built-in job assignment and reminder notifications, your team members will get important updates through the mobile app. This means not having to manually dispatch your team. Instead, a notification appears with all of the appointment details.
Map-Based Planning
With map-based planning, quickly see the location of jobs and your team. Each technician’s location is plotted with GPS-based location and timestamps. So when new jobs come in, you can instantly see who’s nearby and who’s too far to schedule efficiently.Planning a day’s routes becomes much easier as well.
Use a map to plot out the day’s jobs, and assign them to team members on the most efficient routes. Map plotting opens up both your team tracking and scheduling to optimal results. With efficient assignments, your team can complete more jobs, which increases your profit margins.
Scheduling for Maximum Capacity
As your team grows, staff scheduling can become much more difficult. One of the biggest issues that comes up is how you keep your team at maximum capacity. One optimal way to schedule service calls is often difficult with offline calendars. The idea is simply to book jobs for a specific date, but not a specific time. Then assign jobs to your team the day before scheduled appointment based on routes and availability.
With the final schedule in hand, you can notify the customer of the estimated arrival time. This method of scheduling allows you to maximize the number of jobs you can handle on any given day.Combine this scheduling method with templated customer communications to easily notify your customers of the scheduled start time of the job. Then keep them informed with real time updates. Instead of a frustrated customer waiting half a day, you can provide consistent and accurate information as to when to expect the technician.
One Calendar for the Entire Team
There are a lot of great ways to use scheduling tools. But one of the biggest benefits is simply having one, central calendar that keeps everyone up-to-date. This allows everyone to use the calendar in the way that works best for them. For example, filling last-minute appointment windows might benefit from the Gantt view. When plotting the next day’s team schedule, being able to check the map and plan routes is much more efficient.
But for a technician in the field, it’s important to see the day’s jobs in an agenda view. As updates are made, everyone sees the same information in their preferred view. This means you capture all of the same information and changes in a standard process, but personalize the calendar for every team member. This makes the software easier to use and improves the likelihood of them using it consistently.
Get Better Results with HVAC Scheduling Software
HVAC scheduling has never been easier, and neither has meeting your customer’s expectations. More importantly, you’ll be able to increase efficiency and improve profitability at the same time.
From what was once one of the most stressful parts of running an HVAC business, scheduling can now be one of the keys to increasing your bottom line. Stay on top of every job and customer with integrated information, simultaneously available in the office and in the field, by using FieldPulse HVAC scheduling software.
