Retriever Field Service
Retriever Field Service delivers industry-leading field service application technology to organisations in a range of industries, including asset management and maintenance. The mobile component runs natively on Android, iOS and Windows operating systems, providing asset management, forms, time-sheets, purchase orders, work done and more. Completely offline capable; we guarantee no data-loss and the application communicates all recorded data immediately upon establishing connectivity.
Retriever Schedule provides office based staff with real-time visibility and control over what is happening in the field.
Forms completed in the field are tailored to your business through Retriever Formbuilder, making it easy to automate current paper-based processes. Custom service reports can be automatically generated when a job is completed and emailed to customers, service supervisors or the field worker.
Retriever Field Service can be readily integrated with most corporate systems.
Retriever Mobile Application
The mobile application is the heart of the Retriever Field Service solution. The application is configured so that it closely matches the field worker process workflow, so they can do their work in the most effective and efficient way.
Different job types and workflows
In the Retriever solution, it is possible to define different workflows for different type of jobs. For example, a planned maintenance job will work differently to a reactive job or a field inspection. The mobile application will reflect this and therefore the field worker will be presented with the correct workflow for doing that particular type of work in the most efficient way.
Asset Management and Maintenance
Capturing data about the assets in the field using general asset information and customised forms. Each asset can be serviced and maintained separately. If an asset is missing or unknown at the time of job creation, then this can be added in the field from a catalogue of known assets.
User-defined forms
The user-defined forms (maintained in Retriever Formbuilder) can be implemented and used at different points in the mobile application:
- Pre-job form: used for safety checks and/or pre-job information like customer confirmation.
- Job type form: specific data for a particular job type like reactive work or planned maintenance.
- Job form: capture data for a job that is not specific to a type of job. For example, a quote.
- Asset type form: capture data for a specific asset based on the type of asset.
- Asset form: data capture for a particular asset but more general. For example, a work order request.
The mobile application captures timestamps at each state change of a job. For example, on arrival at the site a timestamp is captured against that status change.
The field worker can also record different time types (e.g. travel, work, double) whilst on the job. This information can be used for invoicing to the customer.
Documents such as work instructions, procedure manuals or safety data sheets can easily be viewed by the field worker, even when out of coverage. Documents can be maintained in a cloud based system such as OneDrive and integrated to Retriever Field Service.
Historical site visit service reports are made available to the field worker so that recurring problems or trends can be identified. The field worker has access to the same service reports as previously sent to the customer ensuring a common record which can be used to assist in resolving disputes.
The mobile application allows the capture of used parts and consumables per asset and/or on the job itself. If required, the stock location can be given as well (e.g. van stock or warehouse stock). When parts need to be ordered for the job then an easy extra step within the parts module is added to enable the creation of a purchase order.
Capture of additional expenses on the job is available. Examples are meals and travel costs.
Parts and assets that are barcoded can be scanned for quick look up and verification that the correct asset is being serviced.
Signatures can be captured as proof that a customer received service or a field worker signing off a safety form. Signatures can be included as part of a service report that is emailed to a customer.
Retriever Schedule
Accessed via a web browser, Retriever Schedule allows users to view and control every aspect of the day-to-day running of the field service business. Retriever Schedule provides real-time visibility of job progress, compliance with service levels, and field engineer availability. Advanced filtering, along with map visibility assists schedulers to efficiently assign work, and to easily identify issues such as late arrivals as and when they occur.
Real-time view of what is happening in the field.
Job status changes are updated in the schedule as they happen. Using a customised colour scheme, the different statuses can be colour-coded so it is easy to identify for example late jobs and rejected jobs so they can be actioned.
Subcontractor Support
Full subcontractor support allows for outsourcing of work while capturing the same data as you would from your full-time employees. Subcontractors companies and their field workers are visible to your organisation’s schedulers. Subcontractor schedulers are limited in visibility to only their own subcontractor sub-tree.
Jobs and field workers can be GPS stamped and therefore can be located on a map. Using the map multiple jobs can be selected to bulk assign to a field worker.
Jobs can be matched, based on specialist requirements or licences, with the appropriate field workers using the assisted scheduling capability.
Ensure jobs are completed within required timeframes with Retriever’s SLA functionality that alerts schedulers and field workers to potential breaches.
Field workers can be grouped in crews or teams whereby either each individual field worker can have a mobile device or one mobile device is used by the whole team.
Formbuilder
Formbuilder is a web based application for building and maintaining device agnostic electronic forms, which users of the Retriever Mobile Application see and respond to. The target audience of Formbuilder are office-based non-IT users; by example a Service Manager or OH&S Manager can view and update questions independent of in-house IT resources. Once published, forms are distributed automatically to all connected devices, and users seamlessly receive updates for the next time they complete the new form definition. Based on the device type the form will be rendered in the best way.
Workflow
Questions being visible and/or mandatory to answer based on an answer given to a previous question is possible to define. In this way workflow can be added in the form so that the field worker only answers questions relevant to the situation. In a similar way a whole page can be visible or not based on an answer to a question.
Import questions for fast form creation
Retriever Formbuilder can import existing lists of questions from other applications such as word processor and spreadsheet documents, minimizing the effort to create a new form. Instead of typing and creating questions one by one, they can be copied and pasted into the form directly.
Reporting
In addition to sending the completed information captured in the field to a back-end system (see integration), Retriever also supports customized reporting.
Data captured in the field can be automatically formatted into a PDF report and sent via email to customers, supervisors, account managers, subcontractors and the field worker.
Different reports can be generated from the field created data; for example a service report can be sent to the end-customer wheras a quote form can be sent to the sales department for further action. Consistent professional reports can be automatically generated and can include logos, photos, barcodes and signatures.
Integration
Retriever Field Service offers a simple web service interface that allows seamless integration to any back office system. This interface allows data to flow in (e.g. new jobs, customer and parts lists) and out (e.g. completed forms, timesheet info, job completion data).
Retriever Field Service has been integrated to many backend systems including:
- Pronto Xi
- Microsoft Dynamics
- SAP
- Oracle
- S2000
- Remedy
Retriever also supports:
- Integrating to multiple systems at the same time
- Field data capture is not directly impacted by connectivity problems with back office systems (Integration is decoupled from the field synchronisation)
- Direct system-to-system integration or using your existing integration middleware (e.g. BizTalk).