Quality assurance for installations and maintenance

In the last blog post I had looked at the quality assurance during the project planning. The most important realization is that quality assurance already starts at the very outset of a project and runs like a common thread through an order. It is independent of whether it is an installation, maintenance or repair.
This is most evident when the service technician works at the customer's premises. Quality assurance here also means not only a final check of whether all tasks have been completed correctly. If this were the only aspect, a simple reading of the protocol checklist would suffice. On-site quality assurance is therefore closely interlinked with the order planning. How can SHK companies implement quality assurance with their service technicians (without worrying about displeasure) with a mobile order management software such as Mobile Field Report?

Proper working materials, complete information

As explained in the previous Blogpost, the service technician needs above all all necessary information about an order. This is the only way to implement it smoothly and in a time-efficient manner.

The service technician needs error-free and continues processing:

1. All relevant information about the order. In addition to scheduling and sub-arrangements of the order planning with the customer, this also includes information about the system itself, which is to be installed or maintained. This includes the location, state, technical features and the concrete procedure for installing, uninstalling, opening and closing the system. Installation instructions and maintenance instructions must always be supplied to the service technician for the order. This is the only way to familiarize themselves with the requirements of the contract beforehand, as well as clarify problems or questions without delay during the order.
2. A complete list of all the materials and tools required. Who would like the service technician to drive to a customer twice because a crucial part has been forgotten? This would not only delay the completion of the project (and the invoicing). It would also leave a bad impression on the customer and lead to unnecessary expenses for double travel expenses and working hours. A properly managed, always up-to-date material list can prevent this. In the best case, this list does not have to be created manually by the project planning, but can be created (partly) automatically by the project details (eg by directly assigning the respective materials to specific tasks in the system).
3. A concrete, project-specific checklist. The checklist is not only the basis for the documentation and the customer report. She is also a guide to the service technicians at work. Installations or maintenance can quickly be several hundred steps for larger systems. Generallists who are equally used for all projects are, at first, less expensive to build, but they have a high degree of error in their implementation. It is then in the experience and the technical knowledge of the service technician to filter out the necessary work steps from the generic list. The result is often incomplete logs and customer reports or erroneous order results. To ensure that service technicians do not overlook a step, but also do not take unnecessary steps, the checklist should be created project-specific from the respective project plan.
4. A digital checklist. The second condition to a checklist is that it does not have to be edited in paper form. The experience of our customers shows that this often leads to the fact that the oversized prints are completed after the order processing. Not infrequently this happens even until the end of the evening. This filling out of the memory is always incomplete and error-prone. The checklist must therefore be able to be completed digitally, mobile and thus directly on site.

With Mobile Field Report, all order documents - from the instructions, the appointments and the routes to the checklists - are provided on the tablet or the iPhone. The service technician can access all data quickly and without paper. These are always up-to-date, as all information is stored on a secure cloud and constantly synchronized.