MobileFrame Blog » Service

5 Things you should know about BEFORE you select a mobile software vendor

Patricia Oswalt — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 19:54:03 +0000

With more organizations looking for field service applications to streamline operations, it is no surprise that we have seen an increase in the number of mobile software vendors within the marketplace. Please take a few minutes to learn 5 things you should know before you select a mobile software vendor.

Proven – Be weary of solutions that have just been released and companies that have just opened their doors. Unfortunately many vendors have gone to market with solutions that have not been properly tested, documented and de-bugged. This can result in problems building your application, training your team, getting support and downtime out in the field.
Configuration – Make sure that the vendor’s solution can be configured by a member of your team on a moment’s notice without the need to write any code. It is also important that you have the means to deploy these changes automatically without the need to impact mobile workers, or uninstall and re-install the solution.

Track Record – Review your vendor’s successful project track record. Ask for references and schedule calls without the vendor being present. This will ensure you receive honest answers without the reference customer having to worry about hurting anyone’s feelings.
Integration – The majority of applications deployed today require integration into multiple back office business systems. Make sure that the solution provider you are considering provides an easy to use integration to mobilize your critical information.
Prove it – If you are evaluating mobile application development tools, platforms or custom application vendors, don’t sit through a power point presentation just talking about the solution. Make sure you get to see the solution working LIVE. If the company you are evaluating is offering an easy to use development environment, be leery of companies that need a sales engineer or developer to demo the product. This probably means that the product is difficult to use and even harder to develop with.

MobileFrame does not need sales engineers. All of our sales professionals are able to build their own custom applications and demo the complete environment including a live integration on every demo.

If you are interested in learning more about how MobileFrame can help your organization implement a field service application to streamline your operations please contact us today.

Do you run a service based business on paper?

Patricia Oswalt — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 18:24:19 +0000

Service based businesses have to make miracles happen every day. Service managers, dispatchers, operations managers are in charge of monitoring and managing the flow of work out in the field. The only thing that is constant in this environment is change. When change happens, and it will… administering this task on paper becomes almost IMPOSSIBLE.

Let’s look at a simple example.

ABC Company utilizes an office based work order scheduling application. Daily work orders are entered into this system, scheduled to a mobile worker, printed out, picked up and everyone goes out and completes their work…right?

What happens when you have last minute changes to today’s schedule? For example, a customer calls and cancels, an emergency job comes in, someone called in sick, leaving you to juggle everything and find someone to complete the work. This can be a real problem, especially without having the appropriate systems and technology in place to help.

Here are some common questions that need to be answered.

What skills are required to complete this task?
Who has these skills?
Are they available?
What parts are needed?
Who has these parts?
Does the person with the right skills, have the right parts?
If not how can I get this person what they need?
How do I notify this mobile worker about the change in their schedule?
How do I provide the mobile worker with all of the historical information about the job?

The point is that service based businesses have to continually juggle multiple conflicting priorities. Without the means to manage this flow of work, management has a lot to worry about. The good news is that MobileFrame is here to help service organizations easily manage the complexities associated with mobilizing that constantly changing data. We have all of the tools required to help your company implement a mobile system to enable real-time communications, provide up to the second status updates, track parts, schedule work orders, re-schedule work orders and much more.

If you are interested in learning more about how MobileFrame has been able to help other service based businesses just like yours, please contact us today.

Free Webinar on April 21st 2010, 11am EST: Automate Field Services Workers with Software and Mobility Solutions

Nick Hession — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 20:58:57 +0000

Register Today

Who: You

Where: Online

When: April 21, 2010 11 a.m. EST

Why: Learn how you can gain a competitive advantage over your competition while increasing your bottom line. And, you’ll get to hear a customer success story firsthand from Denny Norman at Miller Pipeline how they have reduced invoicing lag from 3 weeks to 2 days.

We will show you the benefits of automating your mobile workers using breakthrough mobile technologies and solutions to:

Eliminate inefficient, paper based manual systems with an automated, real time electronic solution
Realize a significant increase in user productivity
Provide instant visibility into job progress and work order status and histories
Improve intelligence for senior management for faster, more accurate decision making
Increase data accuracy and ensure compliance by automating best practices
Capture, store and organize key data including time, expenses, tasks, parts and equipment tracking and more
Integrate mobile data into existing back office business systems quickly and efficiently

Don’t forget to register by clicking this link – Click to Register