Commercial door service provider streamlines invoicing, labor time, and more with a NetSuite-integrated field service mobile app
Since 2001, Piedmont Door Solutions has been the top choice for commercial doors and entrance solutions. They offer custom design, installation, maintenance, and repair services throughout Southeastern U.S.
From their seven locations, Piedmont Door provides expert entrance services for a wide variety of commercial, industrial, and institutional customers. Their services include pedestrian door installation, preventive maintenance, and repair.
Though Piedmont Door excelled in providing the best entrance solutions, their back office team struggled to keep up with the volume that came with growth. They decided to look into field service management software, and landed on the NetSuite field service solution from MSI Data.
CHALLENGE
The company’s core ERP system was dated and no longer supported by the developer. The lack of innovation and updates resulted in slower than desired performance and overly manual processes.
“Our original field service software was an excellent system for over a decade, but we have been blessed enough to outgrow it,” said Tarrell Graham, Controller at Piedmont Door.
Now two decades later, with more locations and more field technicians than ever before, it was clear Piedmont Door needed to upgrade to a scalable software solution that would support continued growth.
Cumbersome field labor time processes
The back office team at Piedmont Door spent a significant amount of time monitoring and correcting labor time for field technicians.
Every week, the back office staff needed to spend numerous hours monitoring incoming time records. If they found an error, they had to manually fix the individual time entry in their service management software, and then painstakingly recreate the corrections in a legacy payroll system.
Even though the back office team spent hours correcting the labor time, they still found missed time entries and overlapping time entries. This resulted in inaccurate and inconsistent timekeeping, and many hours spent trying to correct errors each week.
Inaccurate billing
When it comes to doors and entrances, nearly every customer requires a unique solution. That’s why the field technicians at Piedmont Door need as much data as possible for installation and service work.
But the legacy system Piedmont Door relied on did not provide enough work order details for technicians in the field. While on site, the technicians could access only the minimum amount of information and had no visibility into the inventory requirements for the work order.
This left technicians unable to clearly track the equipment, parts, and tasks required for a specific order. All this confusion could create inaccurate billing, such as missing a spare part or inspection task on an invoice.
SOLUTION
It was obvious to the Piedmont Door team that their field service processes needed an upgrade. They were looking to get rid of paperwork in the field, streamline their back office processes, and increase visibility into inventory.
That’s when Piedmont Door decided to give MSI’s Service Pro a try.
Because Service Pro automates manual back office processes and provides comprehensive information to technicians on their mobile devices, Piedmont Door knew it was the right solution for their entrance solutions business.
And the flexibility of MSI’s Service Pro to integrate with a variety of ERPs helped them select NetSuite as their accounting system.
“MSI provides a solution that works smoothly with multiple ERPs, and that flexibility provided us with a lot of options when selecting the ERP side of the solution,” Tarrell said.
“Realizing that we could start with the field service software, which is the core of our business, and then look for the best fit ERP was a revelation. It made our transformation and implementation much more manageable.”
RESULTS
Since implementing Service Pro for NetSuite, Piedmont Door has realized significant improvements in their field service processes. From faster invoicing to accurate timekeeping to better inventory tracking, and more.
Even less than a year into using MSI’s Service Pro, the team at Piedmont Door is confident they chose the right technology partner to help solve the challenges of their growing field service business.
As Tarrell said, “MSI provided us increased scalability, speed, and most importantly, stability.”
“MSI provided us increased scalability, speed, and most importantly, stability.”
Tarrell, Controller of Piedmont Door Solutions
Faster invoicing and quoting
With MSI’s Service Pro for NetSuite mobile app on their mobile devices, the technicians at Piedmont Door can quickly and easily submit work order details.
All it takes is just a few taps in the Service Pro mobile app, and the work order information is on its way to the NetSuite ERP, ready for invoicing.
This streamlined process allows the Piedmont Door back office staff to turnaround invoices and quotes to customers much faster. In most cases, they’re able to provide invoices the same day the service is completed.
Accurate timekeeping with less manual effort
Now that the field technicians at Piedmont Door have the power of Service Pro for NetSuite in their hands, they can finish their timekeeping tasks faster and more accurately.
Piedmont Door’s back office team spends much less time monitoring, editing, and fixing time entries. This frees them up to work on more hands-on customer service tasks instead of data entry. And since the data in Service Pro Mobile is cached, the number of missed and overlapping time entries was significantly reduced.
All these improvements have resulted in a streamlined, accurate timekeeping process for Piedmont Door.
Improved inventory tracking
The team at Piedmont Door has found a real improvement in inventory tracking with their new systems.
Previously, their field technicians could access very limited work order information. Now with MSI’s Service Pro for NetSuite mobile app, the field technicians can view much more information. They can easily see the service tasks, equipment, and parts needed to get the job done efficiently.
The combination of NetSuite and MSI has dramatically increased visibility and made researching discrepancies much easier.
See what MSI’s Service Pro for NetSuite can do for your field service operation. Request a demo now.
