“In the past, we lacked the capacity to serve an expanding number of customers at a high rate of satisfaction. That’s no longer a problem. I'm always asking for more installations, because the more we have the more we can optimize our processes. With Oracle Field Service, I now have full visibility into what's taking place out in the field, and that makes all the difference in delivering a superior and profitable customer experience.”
Business challenges
As one of the top telecommunications and IT services providers in Portugal and part of the multinational Vodafone Group, Vodafone Portugal prides itself on delivering high-quality services to more than 4.5 million customers.
But Vodafone’s out-of-date mobile workforce scheduling system gave the company no visibility into service outcomes, which prevented it from serving all customers with the same level of support. Third-party technicians handled field service visits, but they didn’t report outcomes until the end of each day. Because technicians triaged and scheduled field service visits independently, neither the customer nor the company knew when the service would take place. Vodafone needed to see its mobile workforce availability in real time, while providing customers with an easier way to book service appointments, and more accurate ETAs. Without real-time visibility into its mobile workforce, Vodafone was struggling to provide great customer experiences.
With Oracle Field Service, we’ve been able to increase installation capacity without having to hire more technicians. That’s a great return on investment that’s also improving customer satisfaction.
Why Vodafone Portugal Chose Oracle
Oracle Field Service, part of the Oracle Advertising and Customer Experience suite of applications, had the robust functionality and real-time, automated scheduling capabilities that Vodafone Portugal sought. Field Service’s popularity with other telecommunications companies, along with Oracle’s reputation as a trusted solution provider, were also important factors in the decision.
Results
Oracle Field Service helped Vodafone eliminate repetitive manual scheduling and streamline common workflows for its entire mobile workforce, allowing resources in the field to easily report and track all issues. Vodafone now offers the same level of service across all of its field operations, and provides customers with real-time status updates, significantly boosting customer satisfaction. For example, if a technician is running late because of an appointment that took longer than anticipated, Vodafone can automatically notify the customer of the delay and offer the option to reschedule.
Investing in Oracle Field Service has paid off. Customer satisfaction for technicians arriving on time and completing the job have jumped from 80% to 95%, and customers can now count on a technician visit within 24 hours of their service request. Real-time visibility into in-progress service calls has improved Vodafone’s first-time fix rate from 85% to 90%.
Oracle has given Vodafone the insight to accurately track how long a service call will take, and can now serve more customers each day, which has allowed the company to redeploy half of the dispatchers to other roles within the company. Overall, the company has seen a 30% productivity increase among its 700 field technicians as a result of implementing Oracle Field Service.
Partners
In conjunction with deploying Oracle Field Service, the company implemented Vodafone Room, a super-dispatch center responsible for overseeing technician deployments. Accenture is Vodafone’s partner for Vodafone Room and is responsible for Oracle upgrades.