INTELLIGENT BRANDS // Mobile Technology collaboration supported on their mobile device . Engineers are able to contact other colleagues for assistance in realtime , reducing the need to return to base for assistance .
ABI Research shows augmented reality is on the rise , and Gartner predicts businesses will purchase 53 million tablets by 2016 . There are instant benefits for field service engineers . Mobile solutions now allow engineers to receive real-time feedback and expertise while on the job , enabling repairs to be completed more quickly and efficiently .
With this remote guidance , a support technician is able to watch and guide the engineer through every step of the repair without having to leave base . Using smart glasses , engineers are able to see a real-time and interactive demonstration of the repair job right in front of their eyes . These skills can be leveraged anywhere , any time with the capability of modern mobile technology , drastically improving first-time fix rate .
Maintenance alerts and list
2 of spares The rise of IoT sensors and integrated technology on equipment is also enabling more efficient field service . Instead of scheduling maintenance when a fault is recorded , predictive analytics and the remote monitoring of equipment through IoT means faults can be detected before they become a problem .
Combined with business intelligence to make sense of the big data being captured through IoT , predictive analytics can be used to find actionable data to inform business decisions . Enabling service organisations to be proactive in regard to equipment performance means moving away from calendar-based scheduling , and towards predictive maintenance .
With sensors deployed on the factory floor , service organisations can monitor vibration analysis of bearings and predict when machine parts will start to degrade , then schedule maintenance proactively .
Tom DeVroy is Senior Product Evangelist for Enterprise Service Management at IFS .
Field service solutions should be able to find and collect patterns of data from past actions and use this information to create generic rules to highlight how processes and services can be improved in the future , delivering new insight into operational efficiency .
Mobile devices are now able to run intelligent diagnostics and capture potential problems . Based on the diagnostic output , the mobile device is able to recommend a maintenance plan and the various tasks needed to be performed , before the engineer gets on site . This technology is going one step further than just predicting when faults will occur , and will prescribe which action needs to be taken in order to fully maintain that asset .
Prescriptive maintenance will take into account budget , time and other constraints and provide an optimal order of actions and the work orders to fully maintain that equipment , all in a matter of seconds .
IoT enabling optimised
3 scheduling First-time fix rates are an important key performance indicator for field service organisations . Recent Bloomberg research shows that the industry average for first-time fixes was under 80 %, meaning 20 % of jobs require additional follow-ups . Inefficient scheduling results in a lower first time fix rate and longer time to final resolution , as unqualified engineers can be sent and the necessary equipment may be unavailable .
Although not a new technology , schedule optimisation is a foundation on which new technologies can thrive . By combining scheduling with data from IoT devices , the next generation of schedule optimisation tools go much further and help to forecast field service demand , service level agreements , potential resource needs , all in real-time .
IoT-enabled sensors can trigger actions when an event changes , and automatically re-schedule jobs around this . This combination allows field service organisations to improve firsttime fix rate , mean time to service , and mean time to repair , by consistently scheduling the right engineer for the right job , at the right time .
Way forward These new technologies are going to bring significant benefits to field service organisations because they are so tightly integrated with delivering improved customer service and improved bottom lines . Traditional field service management solutions are simply too cumbersome and inflexible to enable field service organisations to reap the benefits .
Traditional enterprise solutions can take months or years to simply implement let alone adapt to an entirely new technology . The new breed of modular enterprise solutions are designed to remove time and pain of modifying existing processes . These agile systems negate the need to fully customise legacy systems .
This , in turn , directly empowers technicians , providing them with the right tools and information at their fingertips to better perform their job . Ultimately , the customer receives the best possible level of service . www . intelligentcio . com INTELLIGENTCIO
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