Why electricians need job management software
You might be wondering why an electrical business needs specialist software. Or, perhaps, you see the need for some organising system but wonder why choose BigChange?
Imagine a scenario where every part of your business instantly connects and shares information in real time. Where you can automate everyday time-sappers, like sending out quotes, invoices and service reminders, meaning far less admin. Picture the ability see where your electricians are throughout the day and send them job sheets and certificates through an app.
These are the sort of benefits that BigChange's software solution, created to help electrical businesses, will bring you. Transforming how your office and field workers operate, it will make your electrical business more efficient and more profitable.
And as to why BigChange...because, like you, we're the best at what we do.
Here's a closer look at the benefits of electrical contractor software or get to know our software in 2 minutes:
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Why ours is the best software for electricians and maintenance contractors
BigChange's electrician software is an all-in-one system that links each part of your business with every other part, full guide here. Digital working doesn't just reduce your admin, it makes every business process faster and slicker. You'll have better cross-company comms, faster response times and more billable jobs done.
“BigChange really has revolutionised the way we work ... it is saving 4 hours a job but eliminating the extensive paperwork and data entry. With 500 jobs of this type a year that amounts to 2000 hours – a saving of 250 working days a year is pretty impressive!” Adam Woodley, Founder and CEO Sinewave
Live tracking
Live tracking gives you full oversight of where your road team are and the status of current jobs. Not only does it help you, it means that you can share ETA journey links with your customers.
For electrical service businesses and contractors, speed of response comes second only to safety. When urgent work comes in, you need to be able to send someone fast and capable. That is as true for a single generator, damaged in a storm, as it for a high-voltage system problem at a power plant.
So how do you juggle these problems and reallocate jobs when emergencies happen?
First things first; you need to be able to see at a glance where everyone is and what they are working on. Live vehicle tracking means that you can immediately find which of your electricians are nearest to the job. You can then filter by skillset to be sure that they are qualified to fix the problem at the job site.
Next, you might consider whether your engineers have the equipment that they need to carry out the repairs. All-in-one job management software, such as BigChange, will allow you to check the nearest equipment location, en route.
You can now easily check who is available to take on the redirected electrician's tasks. In just a couple of clicks, you can easily transfer job sheets, history, and customer details.
Documents and compliance
Our job management software for electricians takes the pain out of admin by removing the paperwork. This has an immediate effect across your business.
- Project management
Project management becomes easier with jobs grouped together or set against contracts. Invoices can be separate, grouped or aggragated, whatever works for you.
- Cloud based storage
Cloud storage doesn't just mean an end to filing cabinets full of paper. It removes the delays between job completion and the arrival of the job sheets in the office. It means your field team can focus on job details without worrying about admin. The instant office access to this information has the knock-on effect of allowing you to invoice faster.
- Super-boost efficiency
Moving across to digital makes your entire business operate more efficiently. Your customer information, job history and parts used, are all held in the CRM, saving time and stress. Having immediate access to records also means a better and faster customer experience.
“Since implementing BigChange, paperwork has become a thing of the past and we are far more efficient seeing, on average across the divisions, an 80% improvement. It was also fundamental to our winning the ARMA Partner of the Year Award.” Maddie Carr, Service Agreement Manager, Future Group.
- Compliance made easy
You can make branded template job sheets for everything from site-specific risk assessments to generic PAT testing. When you schedule the job type, the system automatically adds the job sheets. You decide the order of the questions and the type of answers given, including photos taken as the job progresses.
Check out how our job management system is already helping other electrical contractors.
Control your finances
We have designed it so that you can control every financial element as quickly and simply as possible.
- Templates
Set up branded template quotes, estimates, purchase orders and invoices using our Microsoft Word add-in. With just a few clicks, the software will add your job costs, including any discounts or markups. Our user-friendly software adds customer details and pricing automatically. Leaving your office staff to simply press send.
- Accounts integration
Our electrical contractor software also integrates with Sage 50, Xero and Quickbooks. That means full syncing, with no keying in the same information twice and fewer errors. BigChange Pay, powered by BlueSnap, means that you can even take secure, on-the-go payments.
- Reports and dashboard
BigChange's field service software includes easy to filter dashboards, providing real time visual data at a glance. Coupled with our powerful reports, these allow you to make business decisions based on real information.
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Scheduling for success
As anyone who has spent time as a scheduler knows, it can be a slow and complex job. On top of the difficulty involved, there's the added issue of time pressure. In most busy electrical contracting businesses, schedules aren't static. Having the right engineers in place quickly is crucial to your handling reactive maintenance well.
So how does BigChange's electrical contractor software help you stand out from the crowd?
- Smart scheduling
Our schedule optimiser looks at your workload, electrician skills and time constraints and gives you the most cost-effective way to plan each route. As super-powerful as the system is, it is also incredibly flexible. You can recalculate a route at any time, or arrange a last minute stop-off or a different starting point.
- First time fixes
Unnecessary repeat visits are a huge waste of everybody's time. Customers dislike them because they cause more waiting and down time and for you it affects how much money the job makes.
Electrician software massively improves first time fix rates. Digital job sheets mean that electricians always have the right 'paperwork' for the job in hand. When assigning a job, the system will also include information about any parts or equipment needed to complete it. Finally, they can access full job histories and notes and find details of previous solutions.
- Planned maintenance
Once you know that you have reactive jobs covered, you can plan ahead. Create a programme of scheduled maintenance that spreads the workload for you and keeps customers compliant. Once you have set up a job, you can automate the repeat pattern for it. That won't just add jobs to the schedule but send out reminders and confirmation to your customers.
Best electrician app
No electrical service business would send its team out without pliers, wire strippers, insulated screwdrivers, or a multi-functional tester. That's because they're essential pieces of kit for doing the job safely and efficiently.
An exceptionally good mobile app works in a similar way - it is the tech equivalent of a swiss army knife for your road team. Amongst many other things, it provides:
- GPS tracking
- Instant comms between the office and road teams
- Access to your 'library' of digital documents, like manuals and forms
- Easy-to-complete digital job sheets for remote job allocation
- Inbuilt satnav/what3words for hard to find locations
- Photo capture, barcode scanning and more
- A full list of the day's jobs and parts needed
- Timesheet, expenses and holiday request completion and submission
- The option to create new jobs and contacts in-app
- Signature capture
Cracking customer service
For you:
BigChange offers 24/7 technical support through chat or phone to help your business outside normal office hours. During the day you can speak to your personal customer success manager who will work on your account throughout your contract.
We've also made life easier for when people change roles or you have new starters. Our Help Centre is full of step-by-step information and videos to explain how things work. BigChange University offers video courses to help you learn about systems whenever and wherever is convenient for you.
For your customer:
Perhaps one of the least talked about benefits of job management software for electricians is the massive impact it has on customer service.
Firstly, your admin team have more free time to focus on customer support because of their reduced workload. Then there are the additional comms that automation makes easy to provide, such as electrician ETA texts, job confirmations and service reminder emails.
But perhaps the biggest benefit of all lies in the provision of a customer portal. This allows customers to access their job information, financial documents and electrical certificates 24/7. They can even request jobs using it, making their lives easier as well as yours.
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