#1 User-Friendly. Complete Scheduling & Job Mgmt Software.
4.3/5 (288 reviews)Pros
Their web site when used on a desktop computer is great for scheduling and dispatching. We use it throughout the day to line up jobs for our technicians. Previously existing customers are easy to find using their search feature. I can add a new job, and then click a button and it sends the technician a text message with the job description and address. The technician can click on the address link and get the GPS coordinates on their smart phone. The workflow is logical and consistent. When things go wrong, they are good about communicating what is happening.
Cons
We are really only able to use part of the service. While it is excellent for scheduling, it is not useful for invoicing unless your invoicing needs are very basic. The product is not compatible with Quick Books groups. I don't use their mobile app. I prefer their mobile web site, but recent changes have made their mobile site less useful. Their server sometimes gets overloaded and the software becomes unresponsive. Tech support is inconsistent. Sometimes very helpful. Sometimes condescending. If a customer has an email address, it will automatically send this customer a reminder notice. There is no way to turn this feature on or off. For recurring jobs where we go back to the customer again and again, this is a problem because we don't always schedule the customer on the same day every month. It also gives the customer a link to the customer account center, which we also do not use, since we are unable to use Kickserv's invoicing feature.
While Kickserv continues to make improvements to the service, I frequently find myself frustrated because improvements are often not fully tested, resulting in unpleasant side effects. Example - recent formatting changes have made the scrollable area of their mobile web site very small and difficult to work with. Another change awhile back formatted all of my old customer data in such a way that their addresses would fail to appear in the text messages sent to my technicians. I am having to manually change all of these.
Pros
The product is simple to use and meets my customer service and scheduling needs for the price of the cloud software but also allows me to customize things without major programming or fees to get somebody else to do it. I paid for the Boot Camp training and was very worth it just to get things setup and understand the software. It sync's reliably with QuickBooks which has been a problem in the past for our company with other cloud based Customer Service Programs. The vendor has been GREAT! They feel like my team as they always respond within minutes to hours of my questions or problems I do run in to. I just send them a quick email and they help. Also they are always interested in my recommendations and are also getting feed back frequently from me and making improvements to the software. One thing that is great is that they provide a portal to the customer so any changes I make to an estimate or schedule or notes can be seen by the customer (they only see notes you want them to see). They can be abreast with what is going on with their work order. They also can pay for their invoice right online as well which I love so my customers have more control over their payment needs. Also our Kickserv is linked to our website so anytime a customer wants to contact us it creates an OPPORTUNITY in Kickserv for us to follow up on and notifies us via email that we have an interest. I would and have recommended Kickserv to other businesses.
Cons
This product does not handle the purchasing side of things which I would love to see. It sounds like they are looking into expanding this software to handle tracking purchases. Right now I just use QuickBooks for this. I also don't like the HTML language which is required for the setup of the invoice, estimates and work orders templates. It is hard to work with being I am not a programmer. I have managed to figure things out on my own with their help site and calling them. Its not a major issue but something I think they can improve on more. Again the Kickserv Team has been very helpful in anything I try to do or questions I have.
We have many customers that have many conveyances that we have to inspect per State requirements. Each has a different State Identification Number to record and track which we use in scheduling. We have to do much coordination between elevator contractors (Otis, Schindler, Kone, etc.), our customer building owners, and our inspectors. It's not always easy but Kickserv makes things much more manageable. Prior to Kickserv, spreadsheets, Word calendars and white boards were used...it was like the Dark Ages. :)
Pros
It's so easy to use and functions well for most of our needs. I LOVE the Special Instructions section and the clarity it provides in the Overview tab. Tags are also very helpful for our needs. The Resource calendar is fantastic too. Sometimes updates made in QB don't seem to come over to Kickserv in a timely manner but I think they usually do eventually. Overall, Kickserv has been a game-changer for us and I'm grateful every day for it's availability.
Cons
On my wish list is a feature that will allow me to duplicate contact information of one customer and paste it into that of another. We deal with many management companies who manage several of our customers and I have to re-type their contact info into each shared customer that we have. Reports are a little cumbersome to create but I did work in Salesforce.com many years ago and found that to be the case with them too.
Hi Sandy,
SUPER review! You have been a very loyal customer for over 3 years! Thank you. We do thrive on feedback from our customers like you. Your viewpoints were insightful, and I believe they will help others.
Pros
This software is easy to use and some really great features... I like that I can drag appointments from one day to the next if needed. And contact customer service if needed easily.
Cons
I wish there were more alerts that would come up - such as an alert that will come up when scheduling someone that has an open balance so that we can let the customer know when scheduling, also what would be really helpful is if there was an alert that pops up stating that there is already a scheduled appointment open for that customer to avoid potentially double booking a customer (sometimes a wife will call to schedule and the husband may have already scheduled and it gets confusing). When scheduling multiple days on jobs I wish it didn't go on top of the calendar but blocked out the time. Also wish that there was an alert that would come up if a customer address is already in the database to avoid duplicates. Also, wish that email reminders were able to customize so that we could change time frames as we schedule in 2 hour increments - so we are really not able to use the feature which is one of the reasons we picked this scheduling software over others.
Hello Leeann - thank you for your time and feedback. To help avoid duplicate bookings our best practice is to search customers by street address prior to booking. Street addresses are very unique and will display any prior events for that location.
Pros
It is overall easy to customize to fit our needs. There are many features we use and I'm sure many more we don't. Allowing other employees to view, create notes and have user access is very helpful for our business. Also, the search option is great. When forgetting what address is associated with what customer, the search option is a helpful go-to when looking for a random piece of information.
Cons
I wish it was easier to navigate online "help topics". While the customer service on the phone is great, it would be nice to access online articles. I haven't found them especially helpful. Also, when clicking on a customer and then accessing the jobs in their profile, it has been very frustrating seeing old jobs come up first. I don't want to see 2014 jobs, I'd rather see the ones I'm currently on, being 2018. Making the option to choose a date view and then having KickServ remember my last selection would be very helpful.
In-Progress (for jobs) tab is really confusing. We only use Scheduled or Completed. We have one job in In-Progress (not sure how it got there) and don't know how to move it to Scheduled. This is very confusing and frustrating as we don't use this feature and don't know how to get rid of it. Please get rid of In-Progress or make the option to not use, more accessible.
Pros
The calendar and resource views and functionalities are the best features of Kickserv. We have 7 vehicles on the road and we need to know where they are and how each job went. Kickserv allows us to communicate in a cloud based system that all of our techs can access in real-time. When a change is made to the calendar, all office staff can see it. Technicians can leave job notes before they leave the job site, and customers can pay online after they are invoiced by email.
The newer look of KickServ was a real step up from the original Service Sidekick. It has grown with us and continues to get better everyday. It has really begun to feel like we have a real business and we are happy with the way KickServ has grown into theirs as well.
Cons
The technicians cannot see the description of charges in the itemized list of charges while using the mobile app on their phones.
Some issues with recurring jobs - I have found that most of the issues get resolved as soon as we mention them to the KickServ customer service team. If there is an answer, the team is willing to try and find it.
When KickServ lags or goes down it slows our company down to a crawl. It was worse before, and only keeps getting better.
Pros
The software is very organized, easy to navigate through, I like that there's more than one way to search for something. I think the Dispatch View is an amazing concept! I am in the service industry and have technicians that I send all over S. OC, having a map right there and not having to switch back and forth with google maps would be wonderful! I really hope they will be able to fully incorporate it into the software. The texting concept is another wonderful idea I recently saw added. A lot of my customers ask for texts because their at work and in meetings etc, so to have this feature fully functional would be another efficient bonus!
Cons
There really isn't anything I dislike about this software. Recently, the Kickserv Team had to do a massive switch over, customers from their old software switched over to the new one and it caused problems across the board. However, our business didn't suffer too much and Kickserv's tech team was on a solution right away! I also really appreciated their update blog while they were fixing everything. We also had a problem with syncing to Quickbooks and Quickbooks locking our ability to change contact info from Kickserv. But that's been fixed as well!
We have been with Kick Serv through a lot of growing pains. As a "non techy" person, I was very frustrated in the beginning but now have become a believer that THIS IS a great program for our growing business. I am looking forward to see which upgrades are coming for 2019. (Allow techs to search for specific job numbers in the field, colors change as job phases are uploaded with new people assigned to same job, adding the use of our standard quote forms, time sheet management)
Pros
Able to track all incoming calls with a glance at calendar screen. See every tech (color coded) daily, weekly and monthly. Track days off, vacations, in a glance, with customer on the phone!
Cons
Still no way to automatically change color coding as each phase of a project is completed and we need to add different tradesmen to the job. We have to "open" each job BEFORE we schedule a tech to see if he/she is already assigned to an ongoing job.
Hello Cyndi,
Many thanks for the abundance of positive feedback. And as always the suggestions to make our product better and more user friendly is what we thrive on here.
To quickly gather what jobs a technician or tradesman is on go directly to our Jobs index page and use the "assign to" filter.
Ping me back from within the app if you'd like to discuss this idea further. We are here to help.
We boost productivity big time with this software!
Pros
This software offers great functionality and customization, so far has been the one that adapted the most to our requirements. New functionalities are added on weekly basis which is really nice. Price is very accessible for small business. Is easy to use once that you get the grip on it which takes time because some stuff is somehow counter intuitive, I seriously recommend getting the paid support/training sessions otherwise you will get very frustrated.
integration with QB and use of credit card payment is solid.
Cons
Customer support time is frustrating, they take at least several hours to get back to you then sometimes they will reply and stop answering for another several hours, this made us almost regret our decision when setting up our account. They offer documentation for the software but a lot of topics are mere drafts and do not contain a lot of information. Despite the fact that they answer really slow they are very helpful with the answers provided and you can be sure your problem will get solve 90% of the time or a feature request will be placed.
Sometimes the system gets really slow , specially on Monday mornings and end of the month, contacting support and letting them know seems to fix the issue most of the time...
The Android app could use some improvement although it has improve a lot in the last 6 months.
Kickserv allows us to go semi paperless and cuts out time from dispatch to accounting.
Pros
The ability to store everything together.
Cons
It did not integrate with QuickBooks Online as we had hoped. It integrates with it, but not everything transfers.
-Easy way to download and calculate jobs for accounting.
-Great way to have clear access for everyone in the company to the CRM via the app. The detailed and yet simple organizational process with Kickserv has added tremendous value to us.
Pros
-Organization of data and customer list
-Convenient way to calculate weekly, monthly jobs sold.
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Cons
-Sometimes it does not load properly
-Would be great what time notes are added to NOTES section for each tab
Hello Amir,
Thank you for your feedback and EXCELLENT scoring. We have been doing field service work for well over 30 years now. Plus, thank you for your feature request since I was able to submit it within our Product Board.
Pros
We love the simplicity of it, the work flow is really easy with the unschedule, scheduled, in progress, etc tabs. It keeps the jobs organized. We love that it is capable with our QuickBooks keeping our books stright is very important to us.
Cons
The mobile app has had a number of bugs and issues. But we contact customer service and it seems to fix. However we still run into minor issues here and there.
Hi Jessica,
Your company has been a very loyal customer for 4 years now! Thank you. Plus, it's great to hear how much you like our Support team. Keep connecting with us with our in-app chat support because we are here to help.
We have been using the program for about a year, and it is for sure better than other programs that we have used in the past. ANd the ease of talking to a real person in tech support is WONDERFUL!
But there are still a few issues we have come across. One is that it only works properly on FireFox, and is the only program I use that actually works on that browser, so I have to have that on all the time just for Kickserv.
Next is that when there is an error, there is no clear explanation as to what the error is. The program seems to tell me that there is an error, but that's it. I literally worked for about a month with tech support because I could not sync any new customers between Kickserv and Quick Books. This made end of the year very frustrating. When it finally started working, I still don't know what was actually the problem.
The last issue I have, is that I can't make the phone/tablet app user friendly for my techs in the field. I need them to be able to adjust more things, change times, add/reschedule jobs etc, and they can't do it. I was hoping this would help so they didn't forget to tell me what needed to be done, but they can't do it from their tablet.
Pros
Able to change as needed, and easy to integrate with Quick Books. Easy to contact a real person in tech support.
Cons
Don't feel that the phone/tablet app is user friendly
Pros
We have used the software since about 2012. It is very user friendly and allows our company to schedule and keep track of our customers on a daily basis. We love the ability to create reports and sort data but services used, how often customers use us, amount spent, ect. The staff at Kickserv is responsive and easy to work with if a question or problem arises. Kickserv syncs seamlessly with quick books and allows us to easily keep our books up to date. We have just recently started using the credit card processing add on. It was again, seamless and easy to use. Very happy and attribute the program to our continued success!
Cons
There are a few upgrades I would love to see...such as taking a discounted about off certain items. For our business a check box form would be helpful in the tuneup each of the technician s perform, however for the dollars spent it is a great program at a great value.
Thank you so much for your kind words, Ashly. We really appreciate you taking the time out to share your experience with us.
I have already shared my positive feeling regarding Service Sidekick with several fellow electricians. All of us have the common need to be able to access our schedule while out working or estimating projects. I feel like i have a much better grasp on my schedule than ever before. I can access the calender in the morning at my desk. Then on my Android or ipad while I'm in my truck or elsewhere.
Pros
The ability to view my schedule on my Android phone was the primary reason that I chose Service Sidekick almost two years ago. I'm so glad that I did! Our previous scheduling information could only be accessed while out in the field if the secretary was still at the office or by remote log-in once I got to a computer. With Service Sidekick I am able to pull up my schedule while eating lunch, enter a new job that might have just been called in, then hit the notify tech option. This will send either an email or text to my electrician who can then punch it into his GPS and head that way with a descriptive read out of what he has been tasked to do and all of the customer's pertinent information. The integration with Quickbooks Online works quite well with transferring customer info through a simple sync button. This saves a ton of time when entering a service call.
Cons
The only real negative that i have to offer is that when scheduling work for a contractor that will be at an address that is not their home office. Their office address always appears on the printed work order and it can and has caused confusion. Meaning that my guys have shown up at the contractors personal home, embarrassing. There might be a way to simplify it for recurring business partners that work in other places like a remodeling General contractor. Also, with so many features, i feel like i am only skimming the surface of what Service Sidekick is capable of. My New Years resolution is to learn to use it even more effectively.
We do have a new template for work locations and this user was given that new template so you can display the parent and child location.
Pros
The calendar has been easy to use. We do not use it for our installers at this time but use it daily for our sales appointments. For the most part kickserv has been user friendly.
Cons
There are times when we have issues syncing with QuickBooks. It seems this happens when we have one customer with multiple locations. We created our own invoice and estimate template. It would be helpful if this was easier to do and we did not need an HTML guru or it would be helpful if kickserv was more helpful with this. Reports can be confusing to create to pull the information needed. The reports probably took us the longest to figure out how to use. When uploading pictures it is very slow for the sales people when using their ipad in the field.
Hello Debbie,
We really appreciate your time and the feedback you and your team have provided us.
You should always use our chat feature in the program whenever you have a sync issue that you are not able to resolve.
We do have plans to make both reporting and possible custom template modifications easier.
Pros
It was really easy to use. I was able to take my business from 3 employees up to 15 before I started feeling any pain.
The estimates were customization with HTML. We were able to add some very cool code that would add offer banners depending on what was in the estimate.
It tracks every time your customer opens your estimates. Great for know who to call.
The software works well with quickbooks online. The work flow is logical.
Cons
It was week on CRM functions like phone and email integration. The mobile app never worked for us but to be fair our account may have outgrown the design.
There was no ability to group several jobs in to a project. This hurts when trying to find sale conversion rates because we often wrote several optional estimate to win 1 project.
Not having enough features to take my business for 20 to 50 employees. I would still be using it if they had developed a few more features or integrated tightly with a office CRM.
Kickservs has a really nice integration with QBO at the invoices level but none at the prospect or estimate level. If KS's contacts and estimates would of synced and mirrored QBO I Would of found a CRM to layer over KS to get the features I needed.
It has helped me keep track of customers but painfully so. The only reason I have not switched is because I do not have the time to learn a new program. If all of my complaints are resolved before I have the time to implement a new program I will stay; however, service has yet to make me someone who will recommend people or be loyal to this program.
Pros
I like the price point, I like that there is relatively little down time. And I like some of the features the software has
Cons
There are several complaints that I have had from day one. First the reporting is terrible, building a report is often a trial and error endeavor. Even after successfully building a report there are time that it just breaks. Seeing the "Ah, Nuts we'll ninja the heck out of that error" leaves me with nightmares. There are simple reports that should come standard that every business should use. Other than the reports, I find that the software was built to fit many businesses which make sense; however, it makes it harder for my specific business to work with a higher functionality. I cant attach cars to work orders instead I have to print it out and highlight it for my guys. There are other issues like this.
We've used Kickserv for about a year now, and are pleased with our experience. We run moving and relocation company, and have a lot of part-time workers. Our business model requires a lot from the software, and we've had to get creative to make some features fit for us, but all in all we've not found a better solution for a better price.
Some of the aspects that we appreciate include:
- Resource view - allows you to see all of your workers at a glance. This is our most crucial page, and it does what it needs to very, very well.
- API interaction allows us to push/pull information from management dashboards that are integrated with other business intelligence data streams.
- Everything is right at your fingertips - easily access jobs, estimates, customers, reports, marketing via the left-hand column. Need to search through it all? You can do that too. Very fast and easy to navigate.
- Full functionality on any device! I can manage my teams from even my phone's browser, anywhere. I can be on a call, processing a credit card, and logging charges and time-tracking all at once - on my mobile device, no less.
-Very customizeable. Change your marketing, your invoices, your estimates, your emails, user permissions, job fields, etc. etc. etc.
- Help is right there in the bottom corner of the screen, with an estimate of when someone will get back to you. I can't say enough about how professional everyone I've spoken with has been, and how personal the customer service is.
Some things we hope will continue to improve:
- The mobile app in our experience has not been as good as the web page - but you can just use the web version.
- Your workflow experience differs depending on where you start to enter your data, which is slightly confusing. Still, the process is flexible enough to allow you to schedule jobs however you prefer.
- It would be great if Kickserv had a JIRA-type bug tracker that allowed us to submit tickets and see their status, as well as provide attachments, updates and feedback.
- Interaction with third-party software, like Quickbooks or Google Calendar, could be improved.
With stellar customer service, and an ever growing feature list, give Kickserv a shot. Overall, its been a solid choice for managing teams in the field, with plenty of flexibility - even for us.
We can easily see all jobs scheduled for a given day, search open and historic work orders, track the progress on longer jobs and ensure all invoices are created and sent timely. This has cut down on lost paperwork, increased communication, and minimizes the number of support staff needed in the office to keep operations running smoothly.
Pros
Kickserv has a fairly intuitive layout and search function. Once the customer list is loaded you can view all jobs relating to individual customers, upload photos, set up future service and easily move calls between technicians. This is a great program to start with when moving away from an antiquated platform (paper, Excel, etc).
Cons
The downside of Kickserv is the lack of customization. I believe it was originally developed to suit a different industry and while we've found work-arounds for our needs they are still work-arounds and rely on humans remembering the unique procedure .
I probably recommend Sidekick to someone once a week. I've shopped and used other solutions and Sidekick blows them away in performance, features, price, support - across the board. I even recommend it to people who don't need to track resources because it's so flexible, you can use it as a CRM.
Overall, 5 out of 5 stars.
Pros
Super easy to understand and get set up. We were up and running in only 1 day. There's very little training that new users need to use SK.
Extremely flexible - I've been able to easily customize the product to show the things we like to see and to run the way we want it.
Reports - the capabilities of the reports are amazing. You can build just about any report you can imagine.
Price - I get excellent value for the price I pay. Other solutions are thousands and thousands of dollars with little to no support. But SK has flexible pricing so you pay for who you're scheduling.
Support - the support is terrific. You almost always get a live person if you have to call. The help database is a good place to look before calling.
Suggestions - Sidekick is way ahead of the curve when it comes to allowing, considering and implementing customer feedback. I've been very impressed with the ability to provide a suggestion and that I've seen many implemented.
Cons
Old data - can be hard to get rid of. I'd like to see a feature where if a user inactivates a custom field, all data in that field on job and customer records can be erased.
Text fields - have a limited number of characters so your jobs and client info have to be concise. You can't write a book for a job order.
Some features don't quite work the way you would expect (timecards) - they don't actually integrate to QB, so it's kind of a teaser and we spent a fair amount of time trying to use the time tracker only to have to go to another solution.
This software helps my business stay very well organized. My last business I used just an accounting program and had to hire 2 office personnel to run the back end of my business. With this program, I can do my back end with the help of my bookkeeper. I authorized my bookkeeper as admin personnel and from his office he keeps me organized with my quarterly's and end year.
Pros
I love that you can do many things with this software, but my favorite is that it keeps in contact with my customer sending out emails the day before I arrive and again on the day of my appointment. Amazing, it has cut down the to almost 0 of customers missing our appointment.
Cons
The thing that I do not like is when using from a smart phone in the field, you open the program and a number tasks close down the program and restarts. It never lets you use these tasks. Wish they would fix it so the phone can access the program. Love it if I could email their invoice from smart phone.
The software is easy to customize, makes training new employees much easier, and running reports is simple. The customer support team always makes us aware of any changes or down times, and is always responsive to any inquiries or issues we may have.
Pros
The interface is extremely easy to use, and maneuver through. It is also very simple to create your own custom fields, reports, and track data.
Cons
There is no way to track inventory, and modifying customized work orders can sometimes be a nuisance.
Hello James,
Thank you very much for your time and the review. Your viewpoints were insightful. We are happy to hear how easy it is for new users to learn the flow of Kickserv and get started.
We certainly do have inventory on our roadmap of feature requests. It remains a feature that our Quickbooks and Xero integrations do very well.
We should discuss how we can enhance the customization of templates such as work orders with each other. I'll reach out to you directly.
Thank you again for your review.
Overall good experience as a desktop and in field user.
Pros
Ease of use for invoices as a template, all invoices look the same for every client. Easy to adjust line items and pricing as needed. Taking pictures within the app has been a great addition.
Cons
App is glitchy and doesn't display charges in correct order. If taking a picture with the app, it doesn't save to the phone. Meaning, if signal is lost and the picture doesn't upload the picture is lost. This has led to us making a trip back to re-take a picture that didn't load or save.
Thank you so much for your kind words, Ryan. We really appreciate you taking the time out to share your experience with us. At this time, we have added the ability to arrange your charges in any way that you prefer. However, whenever you work around limited cell service areas you will want to save all images to your phone to upload later to Jobs.
We can keep track of all the customers/estimates/invoices.
Pros
The software is easy to use. It tells you whether a customer saw or not the invoice/estimate. It allows you to see unpaid invoices.
Cons
-quick book sync doesn't work right, it makes duplicates of all the customers.
-you can not enter different job locations for the same customer, a new customer needs to be created every time there is a new job location
Hello Jessica,
Thank you for all the stars and confidence you put into using Kickserv for your business.
Creating a new service location for a property manager should be easy. Once you have the main property company in your database, it will just a matter of pressing the "new contact" button, filling in the new service address, and checking the box to associate it with the parent company.
I'll reach out to you via our in-app chat to assist you with this feature and help with the customer-flow-line.
It helps me manage four irrigation service technicians and keep them going where they need to go.