FieldEdge

Overall: I am extremely thankful for the support team at FieldEdge. They are knowledgeable, helpful, and know their application well. Although implementation took some time and we still are improving our data set, we are glad that we selected to use FieldEdge as our SMS (Service Management Software). It truly brought our company from where we were to the next level. We are now a more consistent, more efficient, and more profitable company. If you do select FieldEdge to help your company, my one piece of sage advice is to spend time building out your pricebook for your Field Service Technicians. Adding photos, detailed descriptions, and the like will help them select the right part for the job and help you make sure you are billing the customer for the right part,.....etc.... etc....

Pros: FieldEdge has been instrumental in helping our business automate so many of the daily tasks of operating our service business. From tracking how marketing works, setting up new service calls through our dispatcher, informing our techs where and when they need to be at jobs, invoicing, quoting, historical work completed, and even uploading photos. By in large, FieldEdge has the service process covered and help companies that use it, become better at communicating with customers, employees, and management. I have been impressed with most every feature that they offer. The one feature which I think has helped us grow the most is the use of packages. A package is a grouping of items that are typically sold together. These packages have the individual items used to create the package as invisible to the consumer and a blank freeform data field to explain what the package is. The use of packages has grown our average sales ticket and improved the efficiency of our technicians. Customer love that they get detailed written invoices and quotes promptly emailed to them. Dispatchers love see where the techs are in the day so they can squeeze in an extra service call or two. From an owner and management side of things, I sincerely appreciate how this tool helps customer, dispatcher(s), field service technicians, and our management to all work together.

Cons: Can't really think of any major cons. There are some "Wish-List" items which I have for fine tuning the software, but they are minor disadvantages. One such example is the history of customer interactions. It is visible on the mobile application, but it isn't easily viewed. For example, it may say that we had an invoices in May 2016, September 2017, February 2019, and July 2020. To find if a customer purchased a widget from us, we have to review each invoice to "hunt" for the widget and when or if it was sold by us.

Alternatives Considered: ServiceTitan and ServiceM8

Reasons for Choosing FieldEdge: Our buying process was longer than it should of been. I demo'ed some 5 or 6 different software apps looking for the right fit. Some did better than other in some areas than others. However, despite FieldEdge being a more expensive tool than some, we decided to use FieldEdge because it was a better tool than anything else we saw. As a plumbing contractor, we rely on tools to do almost any job. And my experience with cheap tools is that they may kinda work, but they new perform like you want them to and they often fail you when it is critical. So by in large, we invest in better tools for our plumbers to use. So when it came down to which tool to use to manage of Field Service, it just made sense to buy the best tool available. And from my research, FieldEdge was that best tool available.

Reasons for Switching to FieldEdge: To better manage more technicians and to improve our customer communications. FieldEdge certainly did this.

Overall: Our contact with our onboarding agent was abysmal from day one. Receiving a response typically took 2-3 days or up to a week unless we made multiple attempts. It came to a point where I started keeping track of when and how many times I contacted them before I received a response. Responses were frequently, "I'll get back to you on that" with no follow up. I also kept a list of questions they never answered. We were advised by our FieldEdge salesperson to switch to Quickbooks Online before signing up with FieldEdge for ease of use. When data was transferred from QBO to FE, NONE of the costs for our 2400 items in the system transferred over. Sales prices carried over just fine. Each time we do a quote or invoice, if we want to track profitability or markup on items sold, we literally need to look up each individual item and manually enter its cost. We are six months into using this software, and we have had this issue escalated to a different department, escalated to a different team, escalated to their Tier 3 development team, you name it, yet the problem persists. "It seems we have encountered a bug" We have been offered discounts because of this issue, but honestly, if we hadn't invested so many thousands of hours and tens of thousands of dollars into this software, I would be happy to pull the plug.

Pros: The dispatch board is nice, techs can update their work orders and we can see their status in real time (generally).

Cons: LEARNING CURVE - DO NOT underestimate how much time you will need to learn this software We seem to be an outlier since most reviews rave about their customer service, but our onboarding agent was less than responsive to our questions and attempts to contact him, and he definitely did not provide us with adequate information or learning tools. If you have concerns, make sure they are addressed in a timely manner before you make your final decision, otherwise they may never be addressed. It is VERY expensive per month per user. Our business is open 7am-5pm. Their support team has a habit of calling between 5pm and 8pm, but never when we are actually in the office to answer calls.

Reasons for Choosing FieldEdge: FieldEdge didn't require a contract. It cost SIGNIFICANTLY more per month than all of their competitors, but the idea that we wouldn't be locked into a contract was appealing. Now we feel that because of how long we have spent trying to learn how to use this software, and the money we have invested, it would be throwing tens of thousands of dollars out the window to switch to something else.

Pros: This product did not answer all of our answers, but FieldEdge was always willing to help! They made sure our needs and concerns were their needs and concerns. Their customer service is excellent!

Cons: They are continually adding features so many features we needed at the beginning they did not have. They now do!

Reasons for Choosing FieldEdge: User interface ease of use customer service willingness to find ways to make it work for our company

Reasons for Switching to FieldEdge: The system was clunky. They also continued to want more and more money in order to get the system to work for us. It definitely did not meet our needs.