Field service software with the job sheet on the phone

How it usually goes

The technician leaves in the morning with a printed list or a WhatsApp message. They write the job sheet by hand, sometimes in the van, and drop it at the office when they pass by. Someone there types it up, tries to read the handwriting, and phones the technician to ask how many hours it really took and which parts went in.

The invoice only goes out once all that is done. If a sheet gets lost, nobody pays for that job.

What the technicians' app does

• the day's jobs, with the address, the customer's phone number and earlier visits to the same equipment;
• the job sheet itself: hours, parts used, notes and photos;
• the customer's signature, drawn with a finger on the screen, and a PDF of the job sheet sent by email;
• parts taken from the van, if you keep track of stock.

I have built job sheet apps with the customer's signature before. In the office, jobs are assigned from a calendar. You see who is where, which jobs were closed today and which are still waiting to be invoiced.

From job sheet to invoice

Hours and parts from the job sheet become the invoice lines, with nothing typed twice. In the CRM I use for my own business, the time logged on each task becomes a draft invoice on fatturapa.com, the Italian e-invoicing service. A job sheet works the same way.

If you look after equipment under contract with scheduled visits, see maintenance planning software too. For long jobs with several days and several people, see job tracking software.

How we start

1. You send me a paper job sheet and walk me through a job, from the customer's call to the invoice. This first analysis is free.
2. We start with the technicians' app and the job list in the office. Stock and invoicing come later, if you need them.
3. Before everyone gets it, one or two technicians try it out, and we fix whatever doesn't work in the field.

When off-the-shelf software is the better choice

There are subscription apps for field service. If your work fits inside one, start there. Custom software pays off when your job sheet has fields of its own (the readings from a system, a different checklist for each type of machine) or when it has to talk to the software you already use in the office.

Frequently asked questions

Does the technician need a signal to fill in the job sheet?

No. The app can be built as a PWA that also works offline, like KardPal, one of my own apps: the job sheet is saved on the phone and sent when the connection comes back.

Is the customer's signature on the screen valid?

It confirms that the customer saw and accepted the work. Under Italian and EU law it is a simple electronic signature, and in a dispute the court weighs it case by case: that is why the app stores the date, the time and the technician's name with it. If a document needs an advanced or qualified signature, a dedicated signing service is used.

Do we need an app in the Apple and Google stores?

Usually not. A PWA is enough: it installs from the browser and costs less. A native app is needed if you have to read NFC tags on an iPhone or record GPS position while the app is closed.

Can we use the tablets or handhelds we already have?

If they have an up-to-date browser, yes. The app I built for AREAVISION also runs on the barcode-scanner handhelds used in shops.

Read more

• The service: Custom business web apps
• Work of this kind: AREAVISION: website, back office and app
• More pages like this: Software for one specific job