Service Management, Client Care and Support

Overview

RSC operates in 13 states, more than 10,000 sites spread across United States. Its business was expanding where they were running HVAC operations in more than 8500 sites with more than 300 technician, electricians, dispatchers and drivers in the field to serve their corporate customers. 

RSC Group use VENTUS a software developed by Vertical Markets to maintain Service Tickets, Invoices, General Ledgers, Accounts, Quotes and Budgeting etc. 

The Challenge

RSC Group field managers (Region, Area and Account Managers) were facing an increasingly difficult task to manage over 10,000 active service tickets daily for their respective regions, markets and areas. It was not only consuming a significant amount of time but also requires to prioritize tickets as per criticality, large business portfolio client tickets review and separate prioritization, handle tickets on hold to ensure sufficient inventory and manpower allocation, and carefully review ticket notes coming through personnels in field. 

The leadership team acknowledged the challenges, importance of Quality of Services (QoS) in parallel to determine cost reduction through workload optimization across various sites, managers, and field technicians. Additionally, they aimed to gain insights into the tickets priority, tickets stay on hold and identify the underlying reasons for the delays causing labor cost which enabled them to meet Service Level Agreements (SLAs), continuous improvement in Quality of Services (QoS) and competitive edge in price quotes by appropriately manpower utilization. 

Solution

The team of data analysts engaged with RSC Group leadership to understand business problems, identifications of stake holders from operations, billings and finance stand-point to define desired KPIs and dashboards by using VENTUS and other source systems. Here are some critical KPIs we defined in collaboration: 

• Material Cost, Labor Cost, Sales Amount and Taxes
• Service Margins 
• Billable and Non-Billable Labor Work 
• Average First Response Time of Tickets by Lead Technician 
• Average Resolution Time of Tickets by Lead Technician 
• Average On-Hold Time of Ticket
• Tickets Volume by Region, Site, Customer, Technician and Ticket Statuses 
• And many more… 

The data engineering team developed enterprise data warehouse containing self-service reporting capabilities for power users to build their reports without involving IT team to fulfil their job requirements. Data engineering team developed ETL packages and pipelines to synchronize Tickets, Accounts, Materials, Technicians and rest of datasets every minute to empower operations visibility as quickly as possible. Simultaneously, the data analysts focused on data story explanation through visualization, results review and business users experience in close collaboration with the business stakeholders. 

Benefits

The effective implementation of a business intelligence system, combined with comprehensive training for field managers, led to significant operational and financial improvements. The following benefits were achieved:

• Enhanced visibility into ticket margins, enabling better understanding and management of profitability.
• Optimal utilization of team members resulted in increased billable hours and improved resource allocation.
• Improved visibility into underutilization or overutilization of field technicians and managers, allowing for better workforce management.
• Streamlined invoicing process, leading to faster and more efficient billing procedures.
• Enhanced account receivables management, resulting in improved cash flow and financial stability.
• Achieved higher customer service quality by consistently meeting service level agreements (SLAs) and exceeding customer expectations.
• Reduced resolution time for tickets by identifying and removing roadblocks such as lack of raw materials, technician availability, or required equipment, resulting in improved client satisfaction.

Overall, the successful implementation and training initiatives resulted in operational and financial efficiencies, promoting a more streamlined and effective workflow. 

Next Steps

The leadership team at RSC Group made a strategic decision to integrate various information systems with their Enterprise Data Warehouse. This integration aimed to enable advanced analytics for functions such as Purchase Orders, Inventory Pricing, and Inventory Maintenance. Additionally, the goal was to create role-specific dashboards and reports that would provide valuable insights to different stakeholders within the organization. By connecting these systems, RSC Group aimed to leverage the power of data and analytics to enhance decision-making, improve operational efficiency, and drive overall business growth.