A Resolution to Fix it First Time

It is an inconvenience in the first place for a consumer to take an afternoon off work, never mind a whole day, to provide access to a property for a satellite television installation. If however the engineer arrived with the wrong equipment, or indeed did does not arrive at all, that inconvenience could translate to a lost customer and with the advent of social media, damaging feedback shared instantly with thousands online. 

The inability to resolve field based calls first time in a business environment can also be exceptionally costly. Fines can be imposed for missing Service Level Agreements (SLAs) and lucrative contracts lost.

Historically the problem with achieving first call resolution has been managing the ever changing variables –access to property, engineers’ skills and locations, multiple SLAs, and traffic. But organisations that can swiftly resolve customer issues position themselves at an advantage over competitors and some are starting to get it very right.

Three fundamentals need to be addressed, firstly appointing the right personnel for the job at hand, secondly providing your customer facing field staff with accurate, up-to-date information and thirdly increasing the convenience to the customer.

Digital image service provider Konica Minolta is approaching this issue by using optimized scheduling software in the UK and Germany. It considers the complexities of scheduling engineers with far greater accuracy and speed than the manual system previously used. The upshot is that engineers resolve customer queries based on optimal SLA compliance. In Germany this has translated to 90 percent of SLA objectives being met (up from 50 percent) and the average calls per, day per engineer, increasing by up to 24 percent.

Nigel Lemmon, Managing Director Maintenance & Build at building giant Rok believes that by being more effective in the field it can challenge the status quo in the entire industry. It is looking capitalise on perceived reliability failings of builders by using revolutionary technology to make sure Rok’s personnel can react faster to requested appointments, give more accurate arrival times, arrive when promised and get the job done first time.  In addition to optimized scheduling it’s providing technicians with handheld devices that display relevant information on customer projects, so they know when they should arrive, what they need to do and by when. Customers will also be able to track expected arrival times and change appointments online.

It’s not always the fault of the contractor that first call resolution is not achieved. For OnStream, providers of gas and electricity metering solutions to UK energy suppliers, arriving at vacant properties is a constant source of multiple visits. The widespread acceptance of mobile and internet technology however is helping them to address this issue. They are planning to use multiple touch points with customers (traditional direct mail, email, SMS and the internet) to communicate more effectively with property owners. Customers will for instance be able to go online and book or change appointment times with minimum fuss, thereby significantly increasing the likelihood of first time access to properties. 

First call resolution in the field will never be 100 percent, but significant technology developments in just this last year must be considered by companies, to not only improve internal productivity but also corporate reputations and the bottom line.

By Simon Morris, vice president of marketing at ClickSoftware

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