Some time ago, we posted a couple of blogs about SAP Asset Manager and its IS-U functionalities. However, SAP Asset Manager is not the only option for utility companies to support service activities. There is also this thing called SAP Field Service Management (FSM). Let’s take a closer look!
What is SAP Field Service Management?
SAP FSM is a SaaS solution that facilitates the service processes. It helps you:
- plan service activities via a web application;
- execute service activities through a mobile app that is accessible online and offline. It is available on iOS, Android or Windows
Configuration tools allow you to fully customize FSM to your needs by adding extra screens, for example, or hiding standard screens. And that’s not all. SAP FSM also offers you a customer self-service portal, smart forms, real-time analytics, and a wide range of APIs. You can find an additional technician workforce in real-time using a Crowd Marketplace consisting of subsidiaries, service partners, and freelancers to meet your demands. On top of that, FSM provides a partner portal and standard integrations with many other SAP products like SAP C4C Service, S/4HANA and ECC.
Click here for a complete functional overview of SAP FSM
What are the benefits of SAP Field Service Management?
FSM provides your technicians with many exciting functionalities, enabling them to consult detailed information about the maintenance activities, access documents, execute checklists to ensure correct maintenance, create follow-up tickets, …
It may also create benefits in many other areas, including these:
- paper is replaced by digital: your technicians can directly code the results in the app instead of on a piece of paper which leads to a paperless company;
- faster up-to-date system: the encoded info will be available in your back-end system as soon as possible;
- cost reduction: thanks to the intuitive front-end, the technicians can encode their work faster; thanks to the automatic synchronization with your back-end system, no one else needs to be involved in the encoding process;
- optimized route planning;
- improved decision-making thanks to real-time visibility and insights
Is SAP FSM a solution for distribution and water companies only?
At first sight, I would say yes, because these companies have a lot of service activities to perform. However, there is no doubt that before long, SAP FSM will provide its added value to suppliers and other companies in the utility sector.
Why? For the simple reason that SAP developed FSM to support service activities in many sectors. It is a trend that product suppliers offer more and more services to their customers: maintenance and repair of refrigerators, boilers, forklifts, installation of charging stations for electric cars, you name it. SAP FSM can be an interesting part of the system architecture for all these service providers.
What does the SAP FSM architecture look like?
Here’s a high-level overview of the SAP FSM architecture – from trigger to mobile app and back:
SAP FSM help portal
What about SAP’s release strategy?
SAP Field Service Management is a SaaS-based product. All our customers run the same version of the software. Changes can be previewed by using the ‘Preview Program’ and other ones are ‘silent’ (disabled by default).
Release updates are scheduled on a quarterly base.
These are the schedules for 2022:
Check out this link for more info: release strategy
Sneak preview of SAP Field Service Management
Would you like to discover the functionality of SAP FSM? Here is a sneak preview!
Planning and dispatching. The life of your dispatcher becomes easier thanks to the user-friendly planning board and the semi-automatic or automatic planning functionalities.
SAP FSM help portal
Customer self-service portal. Your customer agenda can change. So, let’s make life easier by offering a rescheduling functionality.
SAP FSM help portal
Partner portal. Make the life of your partners easier!
SAP FSM help portal
Mobile app. Your technicians can focus on their core activities and perform administrative tasks much more easily than before.
SAP FSM help portal
Smartforms. Digitalize existing checklists based on a PDF in an easy way.
SAP FSM help portal
