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First-Time Fix (FTF) is a crucial metric that, when managed well, incentivizes service and installation teams to complete jobs correctly the first time. For OEMs, the greater the FTF rate, the more customers served, the happier they are, and the more they call.
Like every customer-centric company, our customer, a loss prevention and cart containment solution provider for retailers, wanted to improve the first-time fix rate for onsite installations and maintenance.
The suite of integrated products they sell and service has a reputation for protecting five million shopping carts for 47 out of 50 top retailers in 51 countries. Given that cart theft costs retailers tens of millions of dollars a year, it’s no wonder their business is booming.
As they expand, it’s the job of the VP of Global Authorized Services to ensure the right people, processes, and systems are used for installing products to specifications. He needs to guarantee they are working correctly and continue to work to retailers' satisfaction. To that end, he employs independent contractors to augment their services. These contractors work alongside his internal field service teams and other approved service providers. These teams are all supported by a technical team and a training organization. For all of its complexities, the VP’s service network runs smoothly to complete installations and maintenance promptly as the number of jobs grows.
The service process puzzle
A vital piece of the VP's success was implementing a form-building solution. It helped them publish and deliver installation guidance to new technicians and administer post-installation checks. He soon realized the forms, while great for distributing knowledge asynchronously and relieving overworked support staff, didn’t ensure a first-time fix. Thirty percent of installations still required a subsequent visit. Without real-time assistance, the forms required time-consuming interpretation of the product, tools, and on-site infrastructure.
To achieve successful first-time installations, the VP knew he would have to work on other parts of the first-time-fix puzzle—technician proficiency and job duration. He had to assess his current service operations to add the missing service process pieces.
First, their teams need to stay ahead of business growth. Finding skilled technicians is hard. When the VP and his team recruit good candidates, they need to get them up to speed quickly and help them succeed to keep them onboard.
Second, installations have to be done manually before or after store hours. So, everything from scheduling technicians to tracking their job progress, auditing performance, and keeping them productive becomes a challenge. The support team, working during regular business hours, doesn’t check the installation process in real-time. That’s because the external teams had to submit the forms after completing the job, and it took the internal team at least a day or more to review them.
To get new technicians up to speed quickly, streamline operations, and provide real-time support, the VP and team turned to Atheer for help.
Piecing it together for uninterrupted installations
Atheer’s service solution is helping the VP and his team improve the quality of installations, so jobs are completed right the first time. With Atheer’s job management capabilities, they can add instant assistance features, such as chat and remote video sessions to a flexible real-time engine for tailoring any service workflow.
Instead of waiting a day or more to review installation work, the VP’s audit team leverages the Atheer platform’s real-time capabilities to communicate with the installers. They oversee the installation process at any time with access to guided installation procedures and finish audits faster.
As audits become more efficient, more jobs can be done with the same amount of people and resources—freeing technicians and support staff to work on other improvements. Today, the VP and his team look forward to closing technician knowledge gaps by providing resources like product documentation to remote workers and installers. Adding job-site assessments and safety checks before installation will further streamline the process and provide better information on service execution.
Business impact and next steps
Atheer’s service solution is boosting the VP’s confidence, helping him streamline new installation procedures on-site and reducing the time spent supporting installations.
He believes the solution will help him save $60K per year by eliminating unnecessary return visits and $200k per year due to installation efficiency gains leading to the completion of more installations. He also looks forward to reducing the installation job duration by 15% now that following work instructions can be monitored and his technical team can quickly support technicians in the field. He hopes to improve the installation audit scores by 20% and decrease technicians’ call volumes to the support team by 30%.
For this lean team, the picture of supporting sustainable business growth is still coming together, but with Atheer, they can build the service pieces they’ll need for a successful future.
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