[New Technology] Routing for Revenue

One of the biggest challenges for a field service company is planning the most efficient route to service customers so it minimizes drive time and maximizes production time. However, once routes are planned, there are emergency calls, sick technicians, technician vacations, customers calling to change appointments and other headaches that come into play.

In the past, companies plotted out routes manually, often by pushing pins into a map on a wall. Today, many companies use routing software and electronic route optimization tools that help make routes as efficient as possible.

Using these tools, pest management companies can add more customers without adding new technicians, use less fuel and experience less wear and tear on the vehicles. Technicians can spend more time with customers to cross sell other services or meet neighboring customers to generate additional sales. As such, these companies are realizing more revenue as a result. Plus, routing software makes most of those headache-causing issues a thing of the past.
 

Looking for a Solution.

When the price of gas began to escalate in 2003, Griffin Pest Solutions, Kalamazoo, Mich., began researching routing software to better manage fuel costs. At the time, they were routing set service days using a map.

“It was horribly time consuming to plot stops on a map. We had service days in certain cities, which meant we couldn’t be flexible for customers,” says Pam Blauvelt, vice president of operations. “Plus, we’d often have unbalanced routes where our technicians were either light or busy.”

The company decided to use a third-party geographic information system (GIS) that many departments of transportation use. Then the firm hired an outside consultant to help manage the transition internally.

“The GIS product understands road mapping really well and it can take a vehicle there and back in real time. It takes into account how fast you can drive, traffic patterns, how much you are paying your technician, fuel costs and it comes up with the most optimum route for that vehicle for that day,” says Blauvelt. “It calculates the cost and gives you the cheapest way to run the route.”
 

Unexpected Results.

The impact of using this route optimization tool was far more than Blauvelt expected. The consultant said they could anticipate a 15 percent efficiency improvement.

“In the first 90 days, we saw a full return on our investment. The improvement was much higher than 15 percent,” Blauvelt says. “We experienced a dramatic reduction in mileage driven, decreased gas expenses and we could fit more stops in the same amount of time.”

In addition, Blauvelt says route optimization meant more options and flexibility for the whole organization. For instance, when one technician had a heart attack, they used the routing program to split up his route to buy some time to hire a new technician. This process helped Griffin realize that by extending the workday to 10 hours, the company could move to a four day week, even in summer. In addition, the 10-hour day means the company does less weekend work.

“We can meet customers before or after work due to our long days, especially for commercial customers. We do restaurant work early and schools are serviced after they close,” says Blauvelt. “Not working weekends in summer is a big benefit for our technicians, yet when they want to work overtime there is an opportunity to work their day off, vs. us hiring on when we can’t cover an extra person during the winter.”
 

Fuel Savings.

With the high cost of gas today, efficient routing is of utmost importance to Bill Wert, owner/manager of an Orkin franchise in Tallahassee, Fla. He says one of the biggest benefits he has seen since using ServSuite Visual Routing is reduced fuel usage.

“My monthly fuel bill was around $2,700 per month. Once we started optimizing our routes properly, it decreased to an average of $2,100.” The firm had double-digit savings because of the optimization feature, Wert says. “With $600 savings for five technicians, that’s saving us $7,200 a year.”

In addition, Wert says he has happier technicians because they are working more efficiently, their days flow better and they are usually able to end their days earlier.

Jason Schwarz, chief technical officer, Terminix of Eastern North Carolina and Southeast Virginia, says his company has realized double-digit savings in fuel costs using the PestPac RouteOp. With 200 routes each day, that adds up. Also, he was able to add two stops per day per technician plus build in an additional 15 to 30 minutes for them to concentrate on sales.

“Our technicians are paid commission so two extra stops per day helps them earn more money, and they have time to cross sell current customers or cloverleaf the neighbors to sell services,” says Schwarz.

Customer Satisfaction.

Schwarz says his pest control company now has faster customer service because RouteOp allows his team to schedule service while the customer is on the phone. It offers a few service options so the customers can choose the most convenient time, while keeping that technician’s route optimized. Also, complaints about having difficulty getting through to reschedule have decreased dramatically.

“It used to take six to eight minutes to make or change an appointment, and now it’s an average of two to three minutes and the amount of time our customers spend on hold is less than 45 seconds,” Schwarz says.

Ollie Paul, residential service coordinator, Moyer Indoor|Outdoor, Souderton, Pa., who uses Real Green Systems for its routing management, says the system has helped the company in many of the same ways as noted previously. One of the biggest benefits is it has helped his company keep pace with today’s consumer, especially when there is an emergency call. If someone calls who is allergic to bees and they have a bee problem, his company can address that immediately. In fact, Moyer Indoor|Outdoor guarantees they will have someone to the customer’s home within 59 minutes.

“We have more control because it’s all at our fingertips. If we get a call like that, we can easily see that two technicians are less than five miles away from the customer and we can get there within a short time. If the first technician is too busy, we can dispatch another right away,” says Paul. “It’s right now, real time with technicians in the field. And dealing with those emergency calls efficiently and effectively can turn those accounts into lifetime customers.”

 

The author is PCT contributing writer and can be contacted at cbrazell@giemedia.com.