How Field Service Providers Can Reduce Their Time to Invoice
Decrease your time to invoice and get paid faster by leveraging Dynamics 365 for Field Service. Learn more!
Every field service provider struggles to maintain cash flow at one time or another. It doesn’t matter whether you’re a small or large company. It doesn’t even really matter whether you’re struggling or profitable. You may have record-high revenue on paper, but if you struggle to get invoices out the door promptly, you may not have enough revenue actually hitting your accounts to keep up with payroll and other expenses.
Every field service provider must convert completed work orders into invoices consistently and efficiently. Sounds easy, right? Not necessarily when you’re juggling the dozens or hundreds of other tasks every field service professional deals with every day. Everyone could use some tips.
This article explores actionable methods field service providers of all sizes can use to reduce the time to invoice, keep revenue flowing, and keep their business operating as smoothly and efficiently as possible.
Track time accurately
Customers want to see detailed, precise time tracking to understand exactly what they’re paying for. If you can provide that, you can eliminate customer questions and reduce the time between invoice delivery and payment.
Look for ways to quickly or automatically collect time-on-job data. For example, many advanced field service management systems connect to mobile apps your technicians can use right in the field. Among other features, they can log billable hours from the job site, keeping work records accurate up to the second.
Use templates
Starting from scratch with every invoice wastes time, which adds up quickly. Use invoice templates for different customers or service types that you can quickly modify for any new job. You can further automate using digital templates in field service management software that can auto-populate invoice fields, like your rates, service codes, and materials used.
Offer multiple payment options
Different customers will have different payment preferences. For example, some may use the latest payment apps, others prefer credit cards, and others want something more traditional, like a paper check service.
Forcing all customers to use one method will only ever make a subset of them happy and willing to pay immediately. So instead, offer a range of different payment options.
Also, consider offering different payment terms for different customers and job types. Accepting installment payments may not be your first choice, but it may have a positive net benefit if it encourages customers to pay earlier and more often.
Also, consider whether offering small discounts for prompt payment might be worth it. For example, if your business model depends on having cash on hand, it might be worth losing a small percentage of revenue to incentivize customers to pay immediately.
Streamline work order to invoice conversion
What if your work orders and invoices were just two different formats of the same data, and you could move from one to the other with the push of a button? This process is simple in field service software like Dynamics 365.
Your personnel complete a work order by confirming all bookings and tasks are marked done. They enter all required information and then set the order as closed and ready to be posted. That automatically generates an invoice.
Your business manager or the assigned tech can review if needed to ensure the services and parts invoiced are correct, but otherwise, that’s it. It is ready to send to your customer.
Use invoicing and payment integrations
Integrating with Dynamics 365 Financials and Business Central gives you many other options for streamlining how you send and receive money. For example, you can integrate payment processing services directly into your Dynamics 365 platform and with legacy accounting software like QuickBooks.
You’ll be able to sync all of your financial data repositories, so they work with each other quickly and reliably. In addition, adding payment processing to your Dynamics 365 platform makes accepting credit and other digital payment methods easy without relying on third-party agencies.
Collect payments in the field
What better time to collect payment than the moment after work is done? Your service will be fresh in your customer’s mind, and you’ll have a technician standing in front of them. That is the perfect opportunity to collect payment. But you need an invoice and payment method available.
Using Dynamics 365 for Field Service, you can allow field technicians to complete work orders and generate associated invoices from a mobile device they have on hand. You can get a digital invoice in front of your customer instantly and accept payment immediately.
Centralize information
Keep all your data in one platform, and you’ll have a complete, airtight digital “paper trail” from intake to work order through payment. You’ll be able to identify any problems or oversights quickly so you can get invoices in the hands of your customers faster and get paid as soon as possible.
Keeping your field service data within one digital ecosystem ensures you extract the maximum value possible. You can connect sales and marketing to operations and finance. You’ll be able to identify patterns and trends you might not otherwise notice.
Automate your invoicing process
Just because you are using computerized invoicing doesn’t necessarily mean your process is efficient. For example, suppose you are relying on spreadsheets or desktop software for invoicing. In that case, your business managers might spend hours typing up and double-entering data from one system to another just to get the week’s invoices out the door.
One of the easiest ways to shrink the time from work order completion to invoicing is to use centralized, cloud-based field service management software that keeps all your records in one place. Instead of spending your time moving data from one record set to another, modern cloud-based software keeps everything all in one place. Your work orders automatically generate invoices using the same data set. And you can configure friendly, automated payment reminders to go to your customers, so you don’t have to spend even more time following up.
Velosio can help you shrink your time to invoice
Velosio helps you shrink your time to invoice and get paid faster by leveraging Dynamics 365 for Field Service. So, if you’re ready to complete jobs faster, wow your customers, and get invoices in front of them as soon as possible, we can help. Get in touch today.