Optimizing field service processes

Veld Koeltechniek has been a provider of refrigeration solutions and services for more than 60 years and imports, modifies, manufactures and supplies refrigeration and freezer solutions for the hospitality sector, (food) retail and cold stores. With a team of 80 field service employees, they install, inspect and service professional refrigeration equipment. To optimize its field service processes, the company from Groenlo set out on a search to find suitable field service software solutions.

Full-stack solution in need of replacement

Veld Koeltechniek's field service previously worked with a full-stack solution for the scheduling and mobile processing of work orders. ICT & Business Applications Manager Kees Kuiperije explains: “In the past, our technicians had to make their way through various standard processes on their laptop, regardless of whether they had been called out for an outage or routine maintenance. As a result, they would often find themselves spending more time on admin than on actually fixing the problem.” On top of that, the system’s scheduling capabilities were far from ideal. “The system was slow and required a lot of maintenance. Besides, it required the head planner to schedule jobs intuitively, which can be tricky when sudden issues crop up”, Kuiperije remembers.

User Groups

In order to optimize the scheduling and mobile processing of work orders, Veld Koeltechniek embarked on a trial with ORTEC’s scheduling optimization software and Sigmax’s mobile application. Kuiperije recounts: “During the trial, we set up two user groups for scheduling and for the mobile application, which showed us how seamlessly the two systems worked and how they improved and sped up our service processes.”

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“With ORTEC for Field Service, we can create thorough schedules and more peace of mind, as well as improving communication with customers”

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Optimal field service utilization

Thanks to ORTEC for Field Service, our scheduling has now been optimized, with the software automatically calculating the most efficient routes and travel times for our technicians, taking agreed service levels, skills and working hours into account. Kuiperije: “At the bottom line, this means we can serve more customers with the same number of field staff. Due in part to our optimized mobile handling processes, our technicians can now do six orders a day, up from four in the past, allowing us to make the best possible use of their expertise. When we are notified of an outage, our planner can find the closest technician at a glance, drastically reducing our response times. In summary, we now have more thorough schedules and more peace of mind, which has improved our communication with customers.”

Specific workflows

Connect, Sigmax's mobile field service software, also greatly reduces the amount of admin for technicians. Kuiperije: “The main benefit has to be all the time we’ve saved because workflows are now tailored to specific order types. Now, our technicians only have to complete a specifically designed workflow to be sure that all the necessary data are collected and saved. The flexibility of these workflows has been of great value to us.”

In addition to specific workflows, Connect also supports multiple asset processing. “With the old solution, if one of our technicians was inspecting refrigeration units used in a hospital, they would have had to complete the same process for each unit, all of which had to be signed off by the customer. With Connect, technicians can now process all units at once, which means the customer only has to sign off once. This saves a lot of time,” Kuiperije confirms.

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“By combining Sigmax and ORTEC, we have managed to find optimal support for our organization’s work processes”

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Best-of-breed solution

Both Sigmax and ORTEC are proud to welcome Veld Koeltechniek as a new customer. With ORTEC for Field Service and Connect from Sigmax, the refrigeration manufacturer and supplier has opted for "best-of-breed solutions" in scheduling optimization and mobile field service software. Now, they have a full-stack solution that consists of two different, yet seamlessly integrated systems. On top of that, the systems are integrated with Microsoft Dynamics in real time, greatly increasing the efficiency of back-office processing. Kuiperije continues: “By combining Sigmax and ORTEC, we have managed to find optimal support for our organization’s work processes. Moreover, these technical advances will make it a lot easier for us to recruit new employees.”

To find out more about how our best-of-breed solutions can benefit your organization, get in touch.