Dynamics 365 Field Service: How to Update Bookings and Notify Customers

When it comes to field service calls, customer satisfaction is centered on communication and trust. Unfortunately, the complex and shifty nature of field service scheduling can often mean that staying on time and communicating changes are both difficult. Field service centers are notorious for keeping customers in the dark, not knowing how long they’ll be kept waiting for a technician to arrive.  

Ultimately, the remedy for this is automating your communications. Does your field service management system efficiently enable technicians to update bookings and provide customers with real-time booking information? 

Dynamics 365 Field Service helps keep customers in the loop by making it easy for technicians to update bookings and automating customer notifications based on these updates. 

How to Update Bookings in D365 Field Service and Notify Customers 

Here are some details of this process and the different options offered by Dynamics 365 Field Service. You can also watch our quick demonstration video to see this in action. 

1. The technician begins traveling to the site. Right before they get on the road, they use their mobile device to update their booking status from Scheduled to Traveling. This will automatically notify the office and dispatch board of the change, and a workflow can be created so the customer is automatically notified that a technician is on their way.  

2. When the technician arrives, they can update their booking status to In Progress. The booking’s arrival time will then be automatically updated from what was scheduled to reflect when the technician actually arrived. This update will also automatically change the estimated end time, so both the customer and the office can stay in the loop. 

3. If desired, geofencing can be enabled so that when a technician arrives within the correct area of latitude and longitude that marks the customer site, their booking status will be automatically updated to be In Progress.  

Effortless Customer Satisfaction 

With Dynamics 365 Field Service, customer communication and status updates are just that simple! In addition to notifying the customer about what’s happening and when, the data gathered through this process can be combined with other data throughout your business for analysis and reporting, giving you incredible insights into your business.   

For example, all the information gathered from the bookings status changes can be used for analysis and reporting, both internally and for the customer. Internally, your field service center can use these metrics to optimize operations, such as by analyzing differences between scheduled and actual arrival times. For the customer, the booking can be made available so they can always see how long the technician actually spent on site and other helpful information. 

Help Your Field Service Center Thrive 

With a comprehensive management solution like Dynamics 365 Field Service, you can connect, simplify, and automate every step in service process, from the initial case to scheduling to invoicing. Dynamics 365 Field Service is also powerful because of its seamless integration with Dynamics 365 applications like Business Central and Finance, as well as tools like Microsoft Power BI. With all these applications combined, you can fully connect processes like billing and connect data from across your business.  

Need help optimizing your field service operations? We specialize in helping service-based organizations like yours leverage technology to achieve long-term success. Contact us today to speak with a solutions expert about your goals.