In almost every market segment of the entire industry Service Management and Maintenance plays an increasing and important roll. This is due to the fact that products are getting more and more similar and services around the products are the differentiators between companies.
IFS Applications for Service Management™ is a cross-industry, business solution. The solution supports professional services, after sales service, repair shop service and maintenance operations in a wide range of industries, such as: Manufacturing industries, Technical Facilities Management, Energy and Utilities, IT industry etc.
IFS Applications for Service Management™ includes all necessary functionalities to support any type of service company. It is also a tool to handle warranty tracking and repairs for distribution and/or manufacturing oriented organizations. It helps the company to establish good relationships, building up trust as well as deliver the service and get paid for it.
IFS Applications for Service Management can be divided into following areas:
IFS Applications for Service Management is a cross industry solution suitable for various markets and customers. Included components in the solution are therefore dependent of market segment, customer business processes, installed base, etc. Some of the areas where IFS Applications for Service Management has impacted the product include:
Following type of industries could have a benefit of IFS Applications for Service Management:
Product-based service vendors - OEMs and value-added resellers dealing with technologies, such as: computers, telecommunications equipment, office products, medical equipment, white goods, brown goods, etc.
Independent Service Vendors (ISO) - Third party maintainers, fourth party depot service providers etc. Providing multi-technology, and multi-service functions. The service delivery process is core business process. Operating as a separate legal entity or as a profit center.
Functional or traditional service vendors - Hospitals, banks, distributors, utilities, etc. In this situation, the service organization supports many types of equipment that are necessary to provide, e.g., health care services, banking services.
Customer Service Vendors - Is used here to mean service provided before and during the sale. Includes Contact Center, Call Center and Help Desk operations.
For administration, any kind of functional or serialized service object can be entered into the object register, where they can be structured in an unlimited depth. Entering of these service objects can be done in different ways: Manually, directly from any sales order line and/or in a project oriented business, directly via project delivery. For service purposes, all service objects are easily accessable, from different windows, also graphically, including photography of the object.
Most types of maintenance data and documents may be connected to any of the service object. The data can be updated at any time, which is an important aid for any service company. Active and historical service orders as well as preventive maintenance activities and other maintenance data can be retrieved for any of the service objects. Significant warranty information to handle warranty issues against the customer as well as the supplier of a service company can be set up for any service object. Any movement of a service object is registered and can be followed up at any time of it's life cycle.
Already in the sales phase of a service object, it is possible to prepare each service object for it's service. Out of the sales order, the service object can be entered into the required place within the object structure. Additionally, out of a sales order, it is possible to generate a service order for the installation at a customer site of it. When selling spare parts on a sales order, these spare parts can be placed beneath a service object as a part of the object structure. The costs and revenues of the spare parts will than be added to the superior service object as object cost/revenue.
Contract Management of IFS Applications for Service Management™ allows the user to specify and control the service level for each service object and/or customer. Preventive service actions and invoice plans are working together with prices of spare parts and services according to committed rules, which can be specified in the contract.
IFS Applications for Service Management™ provides tools to aid in the receiving, entering, planning, distribution, execution, reporting and invoicing in the entire service/work order process.
It is possible to set up preventive maintenance activities for any specified time period and at any interval within the service object's life cycle . The content of each preventive maintenance can be specified on a detailed level. Preventive maintenance can be scheduled calendar based, event based and/or criteria based. A service order will be automatically generated for each preventive maintenance action. If an event or a criterion initiated a preventive maintenance action, the calendar based preventive maintenance will be adjusted accordingly. Preventive maintenance activities can be a part of a service contract, but can also be scheduled outside a contract.
Extensive warranty functionality is part of IFS Applications for Service Management™. Different types and periods of warranty can be specified against any service object. Different types of warranty and warranty time periods can have different warranty conditions. Warranty can be set up for a specific time period (i.e. for 2 years) and/or usage of the service object (i.e. between 5.000-20.000 km on a car) Within any warranty period of a service object all services will be invoiced according to the warranty conditions, which have been specified. Warranty conditions can be specified against the customer as well as for the supplier. This means that services on a service object, which is within a warranty period, can be partly invoiced to the customer and partly to the supplier.
Metering functionality in IFS Applications for Service Management™ allows invoicing of services to be scheduled and invoiced according to the usage of a service object. The usage of the service object is measured and controlled by a meter, and the service on that service object can be invoiced according to that usage. Invoices may be scheduled on a timely basis. Maximum and minimum invoices can be specified for each invoice period.
Services will be invoiced in consideration to the different rules, the service contract, the warranty conditions, the usage of the service object and the pricelists, which have been specified for each service object and/or customer. For invoicing, each service order is converted into a sales order, which allows the usage of the complete invoice functionality of a sales order. Service contracts will be invoiced periodically as specified in the contract.