FieldEdge

Pros

Customer support is very quick & thorough. There is a chat feature integrated with the software for customer support issues. It automatically creates recurring service work orders, which is nice. You can flag customer accounts as do not service, which disables your other users from scheduling work orders for those customers - this is a new feature that is going to save us thousands in unpaid bills by customers who do not pay their bills. We tried putting them on our own lists, but they sometimes still slip through the cracks. It has phone integration, which not only records calls but also has the ability to track lead sources. I can print pick lists every morning, so I can ensure my techs are fully stocked at the beginning of every day.

Cons

It can be kind of slow at times, although it seems to work well for the most part. In the year I've used it, we've been locked of the system for 24 hours 2-3 times. This was incredibly frustrating, and it would have been detrimental had we print paper copies of every work order. A paperless way to proactively anticipate this problem is to just download a list of pending work orders at the end of each day & to keep a list of your customers in excel or google sheets, so you can access phone numbers and addresses.

It is also more geared towards flat rate pricing, which I admit is more attractive for residential customers. With commercial customers (the bulk of mine being restaurants), I could lose some of my best customers if I switched to flat rate pricing. We track our labor from the time of dispatch until the the work order is completed. If our techs look on FE to see how much time they've spent on a job, they only see the time working - not the time traveling. I've had several jobs go underpriced because a tech forgets goes by the time they see on the software.

Pros

The amount of information you have at your fingertips. Jobs, scheduling, quotes, orders, and Customer information. Customer information is key to service knowing what they have done in the past including payment history, and buying habits. Keeping records under the documents tab means not more filing cabinets. Sales reports and receivables reports makes keeping an eye on cash flow easy.

Cons

There is a steep learning curve. Because it does so much there is a lot to learn. This is a big program, that covers a lot of areas.

Pros

Quickbooks Integration, Cloud Based, All Inclusive CSR Software, TIME SAVER (at least 1 Hour a Day), Real Time invoicing in the field, Agreement fields, Phone Line integration for marketing tracking, Works on Andriod and I Phone.

Cons

The onboarding process is lengthy if your company is organized the process will be smoother than that of a disorganized company. But let's face it if you're looking for a CSR program you know you have to be organized or get organized to be a successful business. The database has to be set up in an organized fashion and even though onboarding is a process it's for a good reason and in the end, you will be thankful all the work you put into it. The system you build will only function as well as you build it. The onboarding team will build it for you, you just have to get them the information they need!

Pros

Cons... ( Did not have enough room in the Con Section) (See Iver all Recommendation for Pros)

As a dispatching program it would be nice to have a fleet management system. A log to keep track of VIN #, When Tabs are due, Maintenance is due, Truck #, Driver during periods of time, Repair and service Types and dates, ect...

Since there are so many tax variations within the service are we dispatch to it would be helpful that the tax % would print on the dispatch and visble on the dispatch screen. We spend the time inputing the tax codes in the system and then applying it to each dispatch, this would be a good field to add.

Cons

Cons Continued...

Reports are good, but I have noticed that we enter a lot of information on jobs that we cannot sort reports on. For example:
When we breakdown an invoice into ESC we enter the resale of: Labor, Subcontractors, Material, Equipment Fee, Permits, Trip Charge, Rentals, and probly a few other catagories depending on the job....
But the report I would love to run, but can't is...
Each technician's production by department in:
*Labor
*Rentals
*Material
*Sub Contractors
*Equipment Fee
*Trip Charges
* And so on

Also, the paging system is nice... unless you have to page a group of people. It would be great to be able to send a page to just my plumbers with one button or just my HVAC techs or just ....

Pros

I love the ease of use for techs in the field as well as in the office. It gives us the ability to share where we are across departments and to see how backed up we are. The vendor Desco has been fabulous! I am in service and I deal with people all day and these guys really know their business! Patient, knowledgeable, and if they don't know the answer they get it for me in a timely manner.

Cons

I think there is room for improvement on the reporting. I would like to be able to print out a simple report that shows how many tickets a tech completes in a day / week / month. Very basic. I also think that even tho we use quickbooks for our accounting, I thinks that there could be some improvement on the reports. Also, I don't like how things can be taken out of quickbooks so easily by people by mistake. The last thing that bothers me is how once a ticket is moved to a tech on the calendar, how the ticket gets all junked up if someone accidentally touches it in the office, it should refresh for the tech so their list doesn't get all locked up every time that happens. Oh and one more thing, when you attach files to customers people can accidentally corrupt the file by opening it and not closing it properly causing the file to be lost. I would like for a way to keep this from happening.