The Massive Potential Of Automated Field Service

By Arka Dhar, co-founder and CEO, Zinier

After years of anticipation (or hype, depending on your perspective) behind the introduction of AI in the B2B sector, the technology is now moving ever closer to widespread adoption. More than 1/3 of all companies are now implementing AI, and it’s increasingly difficult to find any new enterprise technology that doesn’t feature AI in some capacity. In fact, the global enterprise value derived from AI totaled $1.2 trillion in 2018, a 70 percent increase from 2017.

AI’s Application in Field Service Today

AI is increasingly taking center stage in the field service industry, but until now, the most concrete and impactful application has been optimizing the scheduling and dispatching of technicians. One of the primary reasons AI has made the most headway in this area is simple: that’s where field service organizations are currently feeling the most pain.

There is approximately one back office coordinator for every four field technicians, and this ratio results in coordinators spending too much time on rote scheduling and dispatching tasks instead of focusing on more complex customer issues – such as escalations. Given that escalations are oftentimes high-stakes situations, the excessive time spent by coordinators on manual tasks means that most field service organizations are exposing themselves to higher levels of customer dissatisfaction. And while AI can help remove the manual tasks from coordinators’ plates, AI’s biggest value lies in its potential to drive a fundamental shift in the field service industry – paving the way for back-office coordinators to support up to 20 technicians while addressing and resolving escalations.