How Neoservices Elevators doubled down on dispatch productivity and reduced customer invoicing deadlines by 10 to 15 days.

Tell us a little bit about your company and its offerings.

Neoservices Inc. offers elevator installation services for residential, commercial, industrial and institutional buildings. Having worked as a technician in another company and developing a true passion for elevators, founder Pierre-Luc Miron decided to branch off and start his own business 15 years ago.
 
Over the years, our team has grown to 30 employees who meet the needs of a large customer base of over 500 units spanning across the province of Quebec. Our clients consist of hospitals, cities, public institutions as well as general contractors who build 40-story towers in downtown Montreal.
 
We typically work with local elevator manufacturers, whose technology we have mastered. The construction and renovation of new installations are our biggest strengths and constitute 70% of our business. Nevertheless, regular upkeep and elevator maintenance has become crucial over time since it provides us with recurring income and the demand from our customers continues to grow. Néoservices relies heavily on providing an unparalleled quality of service, competitive pricing compared to large elevator manufacturers on the market and above all, the flexibility to adjust as much as possible to our customers’ needs.

Why did you choose the Praxedo solution? What pain points were you looking to solve?

The company grew rapidly after winning a bunch of contracts for tenders and this obviously led to issues managing our organization.
 
First and foremost, our customers’ data, equipment, service location addresses, documents, etc. was completely dispersed. In short, activity monitoring on the maintenance side had become extremely complex and the need to centralize all the information in one place was vital.
 
In addition, we had more and more difficulty dispatching our technicians in real-time. An elevator service company like ours needs to respond quickly and efficiently to every service request that comes in. In the event of an emergency call, I had no insight into where my tech teams were, so it was difficult to pinpoint who I could assign a job to quickly, unless I called the entire crew.
 
Prior to discussing with Praxedo, we had interacted with two other field service software providers however nothing came out of our exchanges. They answers to our business needs were vague and communication was not clear. But with Praxedo, things were vastly different! Here are some of the reasons for our choice:

• The flexibility of the solution and its configuration capabilities
• Ease of use of the mobile app for our technicians
• Communication with the Praxedo teams. Interaction was easy, and their sales and implementation methods were the cherry on the cake
• Unlike their competitors, the answers provided were always clear and prompt

Who uses Praxedo on a daily basis and for what purpose?

The app is primarily used by me for dispatch and by our 5 service technicians out in the field. We have set up 3 types of work orders for our business: maintenance, repair and for customer tests. Work order reports are archived once a month and then processed for billing using our Sage 50 accounting software.
 
We like how recurrent service maintenance requests are automatically scheduled in Praxedo and technicians can also schedule work orders themselves if required during weekends or night shifts.
 
Initially, our technicians were reluctant to using the mobile app, being tracked throughout their workday. By rolling the solution out little by little, our technicians have finally embraced it and I can say with confidence that we have successfully implemented the Praxedo solution across our business. It didn’t take long for the whole team to realize the benefits of this easy-to-use tool. Naturally, we hope to take full advantage of this feature-rich solution and use all of its functionality at 100%.

What would you say are the main benefits of the Praxedo solution?

After a little more than a year, we can see the following:
 

Dispatching has been greatly improved.

Automatic status update functionality from the Praxedo tool allows me to get a full overview of our field activities in real-time so I can make more informed decisions. I saved an average of 15 minutes per service request. Before Praxedo, I would spend roughly 30 minutes on planning and management of work orders which consisted of contacting technicians on their phones, assigning jobs, following up on requests, to name a few. We can therefore say that Praxedo enabled us to be 50% more productive in dispatching.
 

Fieldwork is more efficient.

The technician’s job is now easier – they no longer use paper, everything is done on their cell phones, and they’re saving loads of time. As we manage a fleet of elevators, digging up work order history for each piece of equipment directly from the Praxedo mobile application is becoming an invaluable feature for our technicians. The benefit will be more evident soon, when we’ve gathered sufficient data from the Praxedo tool.
 

Customer satisfaction has increased.

Customers are delighted because they now get reports including photos of the work as soon as it is done, thanks to the automatic emailing function in Praxedo. Previously, they would wait up to two or three weeks sometimes. Customer satisfaction is excellent. We are receiving very positive feedback thanks to the rapid flow of information. Their confidence in us has solidified since we’ve been able to send proof of the work performed along with visual elements to back it up. It also allows us to shorten the time it takes to approve bids. Customers have a greater understanding of what we’re doing, so they have fewer questions and validate quotes much faster.
 

A much faster invoicing process.

Praxedo has enabled us to shorten our customer invoicing deadlines by roughly 10 to 15 days since we now receive completed work order reports in real-time and can process them as we go. The other advantage is that our average payment collection times have been shortened and allow us to better secure our cash flow.

How do you envision working with us in the future?

We plan to integrate Praxedo with Sage 50, our accounting software in the future, which will prevent us from duplicating information.
 
A large part of our business involves construction and the management of new elevator installations. We are thinking about how Praxedo could help us manage these activities, particularly for time tracking purposes.

If you had to summarize the Praxedo solution in a few words, what would they be?

Centralized information and intelligent scheduling.