Five must-have features of FSM Software to boost business Performance

For a flooring business that operates through field services, flooring software is a must. Without the technical aid facilitated by such software, handling the field operations and field workforce gets very tricky. But picking flooring software for your business is another tricky job as there are many software suites available in the market and the features of these suites vary.

While some firms go for customized apps, it is also true that developing a customized app is a time taking task. Also, the relevance, applicability, and efficiency of a newly-developed app in the real world is something to be known with time only. Thus, it is always a safe and smart choice to go for a ready-to-use flooring software that has been tried and tested in the market.

But it may get difficult for organizations to decide what kind of features are needed in their flooring software. Taking the cue, this article has listed a few key features that are a must to have in flooring software.

• Real-time tracking: When the field service agents are out in the field for a job, the back-office manager should have the provision to track the field movements on a real-time basis. The live-location of the field agents, the tools, equipment, and material they are carrying along, their work status, payment transactions, number of phone calls they are making, etc such information should be available with the manager. Thus, flooring software should be efficient at providing the facility of real-time tracking with features like instant messaging, geo-tagging, push notifications, remote worksheet filling, remote attendance, etc.

• Expense estimation and management: You must choose a software that can function as a flooring estimating software and help you with budget estimates and expense management so that you can keep the operational cost under control. Relying on spreadsheets for keeping the expenses log or to calculate the budget estimation, has a limitation as it doesn't sync data automatically in a centralized database, thus require manual sharing. Thus, keeping the data updated while on-the-move is a challenge. These challenges can be efficiently addressed with a flooring app, as gets remarkably convenient for the manager to track the finances, monetary transactions, expenses, budget estimations from anywhere and at any time.

• Reporting: Certain self-service tasks like attendance marking, field report submission, worksheet filling, reimbursement claims submission, etc. are essential, but these are repetitive tasks and often take a dig into the agent's productive time. However, flooring software provides service agents remote access into the organizational system. Thus, they can perform reporting related jobs from anywhere without physically vesting the office premises.

• Job scheduling: For the timely completion of a job, it is imperative to give it the right start, which requires effective job scheduling. The flooring software enables the manager to automate the job scheduling process, wherein the jobs can be scheduled as per the availability of the service agents, their commitment to other projects, availability of inventory stocks. Thus, it becomes easy for the manager to make a proper schedule calendar.

• Data management: To keep the entire business in one loop, centralized data management is essential. However, when it comes to data sharing, there is an increased dependency on others, this is again a very common productivity leak. However, the flooring app functions as a centralized database. Thus, without being dependent on others, one can easily access the data in real-time, provided they have the necessary access permission.

These features are essential for improving the overall service efficiency levels and maximizing profitability.