A successful career, just like a successful marriage, takes a lot of hard work and dedication. In companies today, it is unusual to have one or two employees celebrate a 10 year anniversary, but dESCO was fortunate enough to have 5 employees hit that achievement in 2011 alone. Aside from those five, there are 4 employees with over 15 years tenure, 2 with over 20 years and one who will be celebrating 25 years of service in 2012.  Currently, the average dESCO employee tenure is 9.7 years – an amazing achievement!

The culture at dESCO has long stood out in contrast to more freewheeling software companies who continually seek to lure new employees, creating a constant churn. While dESCO has established a strong base of long-tenured employees, many of whom have spent their entire careers here, that model is hardly common in today’s workplace.

“It is important to me to hire the right people and retain them over the long haul in order to give our customers the best all-around experience with our company and products,” explained Dean E. Schreiner dESCO Owner and President. “We have built an environment that permits creativity and autonomy, while maintaining the discipline to stay focused on the needs and goals of our customers.”

This commitment and loyalty is translated to dESCO customers through each interaction. dESCO’s customer service/support process is high-touch and focused on total care, digging deep into each customer’s business needs to deliver true results. With clear communications and a personal approach to help service companies overcome business challenges, dESCO values cultivating long-term customer relationships and having the opportunity to watch businesses grow and thrive.

While its employees give the company a competitive advantage in the marketplace, dESCO remains committed everyday to converting that into continued success. With over 6,000 dESCO customers nationwide, great products AND great people really do make the difference.

2011 was an exciting year for the Services Industry and according to the experts it seems 2012 will be even more action-packed. But, before we look into the future, let’s take a quick look at 2011 and the memorable moments. So in honor of the SportsCenter Top Ten List, I give you the top ten ESC version 12 highlights of 2011 in NO particular order.

#10 More Features Added to the ESC Mobile App
Although the ESC Mobile App was not new in 2011, the screen navigation was redesigned to make it easier to find the information you need. Additional new features include a new mobile management feature allowing managers/supervisors to modify and assign dispatches, promised dates and times of dispatches while in the field. Equipment can now be attached and edited through the mobile apps to help keep more accurate customer records. Credit cards can be processed in the field using ESC’s new Merchant Warehouse integration.

#9 Increase Customer Communications Automatically Through ESC
ESC users can automatically send an email to customers to inform them of the status of their dispatch. This can be configured for each status code so you can remind the customer of their appointment, tell them when you’re on the way, send a technician profile and picture and even send them a survey or a coupon after the dispatch is complete.

#8 Managing Service Agreements Becomes Easier with Added ESC Features
The Service Agreement screen was revised to include a robust new scheduling system; enhanced invoicing options allow you to include renewal amounts on particular dispatches to ensure the customer renews; additional options on the qualification screen allow you to easily combine service work with scheduled maintenance to decrease the number of trips you make and increase your profitability; and the ability to automatically order all parts required for service agreement dispatches, ensuring that you will always have the parts you need to complete your agreements.

#7 ESC Adds the Ability to Color Code the Dispatch Board
For increased visibility and priority associations, the ability to add colors to dispatches on the dispatch board was added.  These colors can be assigned directly to dispatches or to customers for all future dispatches.

#6 Encourage Your Sales Staff with ESC Spiff and Commission Tracking
ESC now includes spiff and commission tools. A spiff can be attached to any billing code or inventory item to track these bonuses by salesperson and can be set to a flat rate or a percentage of the sale price. The new three tiered commission system allows you to increase the commission percentage to those who exceed their sales goals and gives you the flexibility to set different goals for your technicians and sales people.

#5 Comparing Vendor Prices Made Possible with ESC
When ordering parts on a dispatch, invoice or quote, view a list of all the vendors that carry that part, their part number, last price from that vendor and the date the price was last obtained. This information will be updated automatically as you receive items and can be manually updated as well to ensure you are always getting the best deal possible.

#4 ESC Adds Revolutionary New List Views
This new feature allows you to quickly view lists of your customers, jobs, dispatches, equipment, agreements, invoices, quotes, vendors, inventory items and purchase orders. These lists can be customized to show just the information you want to see in the order you want to see it as well as saved and recalled easily. Use these lists to quickly find records, print custom reports, export data to Excel, and send emails or letters.

#3 ESC Allows You to Track and Bill Travel Time
Travel time can now be added to the working time when creating an invoice based on a dispatch in ESC. These times will be combined on the Technicians tab of the Sales Invoicing screen to increase the cost of the invoice. The time will also be shown immediately above the invoice body so you will know what quantity to use when adding a labor billing code to the invoice.

#2 ESC Credit Card Transactions Become PCI Compliant with Merchant Warehouse
Through a recent partnership with Merchant Warehouse card services, ESC credit card transactions can become PCI compliant in adhering to security and liabilities. Merchant Warehouse uses strong encryption technology ensuring the safe handling of cardholder information, which tremendously reduces your liability.

#1 Service Roundtable selects ESC as the Preferred Service Management Software
The Service Roundtable is a revolutionary organization founded by a collaboration of leading contractors to share information and help other contractors improve their sales, marketing, operations and profitability. ESC was chosen as the recommended service management software solution for its complete solution to manage customers, work, and finances in an intuitive, easy-to-use environment with the tools and features growing service companies need.

With a recent string of hackers breaching security, stealing sensitive customer credit card information and stealing money from customer bank accounts, it makes me wonder why service companies would not want to protect themselves further with simple painless measures. 

One important step is becoming PCI compliant with credit card transactions.  But you are probably wondering why … what’s the big deal? At first glance, especially if you are a smaller service company, it may seem like a confusing topic and a daunting task.  But let me break it down for you.

PCI Compliance Benefits Versus Consequences
Compliance with data security standards can bring major benefits to businesses of all sizes, while failure to comply can have serious and long-term negative consequences. Here are some reasons why.

• Compliance with the PCI DSS means that your systems are secure, and customers can trust you with their sensitive payment card information. Trust means your customers have confidence in doing business with you and confident customers are more likely to be repeat customers, and to recommend you to others.
• Compliance improves your reputation with acquirers and payment brands — the partners you need in order to do business.
• Compliance is an ongoing process, not a one-time event. It helps prevent security breaches and theft of payment card data, not just today, but in the future. As data compromise becomes ever more sophisticated, it becomes ever more difficult for an individual merchant to stay ahead of the threats. The PCI Security Standards Council is constantly working to monitor threats and improve the industry’s means of dealing with them, through enhancements to PCI Security Standards and by the training of security professionals. When you stay compliant, you are part of the solution – a united, global response to fighting payment card data compromise.

But if you are not compliant, it could be disastrous. Compromised data negatively affects consumers, merchants, and financial institutions. Just one incident can severely damage your reputation and your ability to conduct business effectively, far into the future. Account data breaches can lead to catastrophic loss of sales, relationships and standing in your community, and depressed share price if yours is a public company. Possible negative consequences also include lawsuits, insurance claims, cancelled accounts, payment card issuer fines and government fines.

Achieving PCI Compliance is EASY
Through a recent partnership with Merchant Warehouse, ESC has become PCI compliant, in adherence to security and liabilities, when handling customers’ credit card information. Merchant Warehouse uses strong encryption technology ensuring the safe handling of cardholder information, which tremendously reduces your liability. Plus ESC Version 12 customers using Merchant Warehouse services have also seen lower rates and improved efficiency.

You’ve worked hard to build your business – make sure you secure your success by securing your customers’ payment card data. Your customers depend on you to keep their information safe – repay their trust with compliance to the PCI Security Standards. Contact dESCO or register for more information with Merchant Warehouse to take the first step toware PCI compliance today.

 [Via PCI Security Standards Council: https://www.pcisecuritystandards.org/security_standards/why_comply.php]

Like it or not, the workforce is increasingly mobile and workers on the go need to be fully productive from mobile devices. Service companies need to keep up with the demand of an ever-growing digital world and should take advantage of the continued streamlined benefits that go along with a mobile solution. A recent article in The Air Conditioning/Heating/Refrigeration News speaks to this very message.

Most service companies already have cell phones distributed to improve in-the-field communications and most cell phone providers now offer bundled text/phone/internet solutions that are the same price if not cheaper than the individual plans. Adding a mobile service management solution will organize and streamline the work flow of both small and large service companies, making them more manageable and profitable.

ESC Mobile is a simple and affordable way to outfit your mobile technicians with real-time job information and time tracking. ESC Mobile is a powerful and intuitive smartphone, tablet and laptop App for Service Technicians to manage work orders in the field, Technician managers to manage technicians in the field and office personnel to monitor everything with real-time updates to and from the field.

ESC Mobile has all the tools and features growing service companies need. Benefits and advantages include:

• Increased tech productivity by arming your team with the right information in the field ensuring jobs are completed faster and more efficiently.
• Increased response time with features such as GPS tracking and mapping.
• Increased field accuracy with access to all information needed to identify and work on the right equipment and eliminate illegible hand-written field notes.
• Increased customer care and professionalism with easy access to complete customer information across your network.
• Increased sales by increasing the productivity of your technicians and in turn allowing them to complete more jobs daily as well as giving your team information needed to quickly identify up and cross sale opportunities.
• Reduced costs by identifying areas of waste and inefficiencies. (Example. Reduced fuel costs with ESC’s route optimization and mapping functions.)
• Improved internal communications by giving your employees access up-to-the-minute company and customer information, all in a single location.
• Improved external communications with appointment reminders, status updates, technician profile emails, surveys, coupons and more.  
• Reduced collections by allowing techs to process payments in the field lowering processing costs, ensuring accuracy, reducing collection issues and improving cash flow.

The benefits of implementing a mobile solution far outweigh the cost. So what are you waiting for? Contact us today for a personalized demo on our ESC mobile solution.

The following is a post by our Vice President of Operations, Eric Rausin: 

We are proud to announce the release Electronic Service Control (ESC) Version 12. This release includes a huge amount of requests we have received from our customers over the years. Color coding dispatches, customized reporting layouts, credit holds for past due customers and a mobile management feature for the mobile phone clients are just some of the great ideas we have implemented in ESC Version 12.

If you are already an ESC customer, you can upgrade now by logging into the support portal and starting the upgrade.

If you are not yet and ESC customer and would like to get a demo of the new features in ESC Version 12, please sign up for a demo using the form at the bottom of this post.

New Features in ESC Version 12

New List Views
This revolutionary new feature allows you to quickly view lists of your customers, jobs, dispatches, equipment, agreements, invoices, quotes, vendors, inventory items and purchase orders. These lists can be customized to show just the information you want to see in the order you want to see it. Custom lists can then be saved so that they are available again with just the click of a button. Use these lists to quickly find records, print custom reports, export data to Excel, and send emails or letters.

Revised Service Agreements
The Service Agreement screen has been revised to make it even easier to use. This includes an entirely new scheduling system that can handle any scenario you can throw at it. Enhanced invoicing options allow you to include renewal amounts on particular dispatches to ensure the customer renews. Additional options on the qualification screen allow you to easily combine service work with scheduled maintenance to decrease the number of trips you make and increase your profitability. Rounding out the new features is the ability to automatically order all parts required for service agreement dispatches, ensuring that you will always have the parts you need to complete your agreements.

Color Coded Dispatch Board
Turn high priority dispatches red or make service agreement calls green. Associate any color with a priority and assign them to dispatches on the fly or assign them to customers so that their dispatches become that color automatically.

Other Dispatching Improvements

• An unlimited number of employees can now be added to a dispatch board.
• Weekly view only shows one week back from the current date. This will speed up the display of dispatch boards that contain older, uncompleted dispatches.
• The name of the Dispatch Schedule Report has now been changed to Search for Dispatch and it can be found under the Dispatch pull-down menu. This feature now includes the ability to search for dispatches by the customer’s purchase order number as well as any comments in the dispatch notes.

SPIFF Tracking
Encourage your people to sell particular items by rewarding them for selling it. A SPIFF can be attached to any billing code or inventory item to track these bonuses by salesperson. SPIFFs can be set to a flat rate or a percentage of the sale price.

Commissions
A new three tier commission system has been implemented so you can reward your personnel for selling effectively. This feature allows you to increase the commission percentage to those who exceed their sales goals. The flexibility of this system allows you to set different goals for your technicians and sales people.

Customer Status Updates
Automatically send an email to your customer to inform them of the status of their dispatch. This can be configured for each status code so you can remind the customer of their appointment, tell them when you’re on the way, and even send them a survey or a coupon after the dispatch is complete.

More Powerful Customer Entry Screen
The addition of an equipment and history tab to the customer entry screen gives you the ability to update almost everything about a customer on a single screen.

Better Email Control
Each email address entered into the system for a customer can be set to receive status updates and marketing materials, invoices and statements, or everything you care to send.

Compare Vendor Prices
When ordering parts on a dispatch, invoice or quote, it is now possible to see a list of all the vendors that carry that part, their part number, last price from that vendor and the date the price was obtained. This information will be updated automatically as you receive items and can be manually updated as well to ensure you are always getting the best deal possible.

Other Purchasing Enhancements

• You can now add extra shipping methods to purchase orders. This makes it easy to track if something is being shipped via Fed Ex or UPS.
• The date of the accounts payable invoice that is created in QuickBooks or Peachtree when items have been received can now be modified.

New & Updated Reports

• Sales Item Summary – This report can be used to see the total number of items sold for a certain period, department or salesperson.
• Technician Sales Summary – This is the report you want to motivate and manage your technicians. It allows you to track total revenue, average revenue per invoice, gross profit, hours and profit per hour for all your technicians. Show them how they stack up against each other and watch them improve.
• Rejected Quote Analysis – See the reason customers didn’t buy from you using this report. This works with the new reason rejected field that will appear automatically on a quote whenever it is rejected.
• Top Customers – See a list of your top 20 customers based on either total revenue or gross profit.
• Commission Report – See the commissions and SPIFFs earned by your employees.
• Agreement Renewal Rate – This report allows you to see how many customers have renewed their agreements and compare that against those that have not.
• Income Statement Budget Comparison & 2 Year Comparison – Although these reports are not new, they have been reformatted to include percentages. These reports are only available in ESC Accounting.
• The Sales Trend Report on the Dashboard has been updated so that it always shows the last twelve months, making it easier to get a quick comparison, particularly after the beginning of the year.

Mobile Phone Apps Upgrades

• Redesigned screen navigation to make it easier to find the information you need.
• Added a new mobile management feature that allows users to assign dispatches to other users. Managers can also modify the promised dates and times of dispatches using this feature.
• Equipment can now be attached and edited on the mobile apps, making it easy to keep accurate records of exactly what the customer has at their site.
• Ability to authorize credit cards in the field using ESC’s new Merchant Warehouse integration. The Android app even supports specialized credit card readers available directly from Merchant Warehouse.

Track & Bill Travel Time
Travel time can now be added to the working time when creating an invoice based on a dispatch. These times will be combined on the Technicians tab of the Sales Invoicing screen to increase the cost of the invoice. The time will also be shown immediately above the invoice body so you will know what quantity to use when adding a labor billing code to the invoice. This feature can be enabled by going to Company | System Setup | Dispatch and selecting Bill for Travel and Work Time.

Prevent Sales of Out-Of-Stock Items
You can now control whether out-of-stock items can be placed on an invoice. Select No and the item must be stock before it can be added to the invoice. Select Prompt to remind you when you place an out-of-stock item on the invoice. To keep things consistent with previous versions of ESC, this will be set to Yes initially. You can change this setting by going to Company | System Setup | Inventory.

Batch Email Invoices
The Batch Print Invoices screen has been renamed and upgraded to allow you to either print or email a selection of invoices to your customers. This is particularly useful for invoices created by the service agreement module.

Canadian Postal Code Support
Canadian postal codes will now be automatically saved into the Zip Code Maintenance screen when they are entered on the Enter Customers screen. This will allow you to type the postal code in the City field when creating new customers. This will automatically populate the city and province while moving the postal code to the appropriate field.

Credit Holds
ESC Version 12 adds the ability to stop users from creating dispatches for customers that have a certain credit rating. This credit rating can also be color coded so that it will be easy to see on the Qualification screen when a customer first calls you.

Customized Toolbars
Configure your toolbars to allow easy access to the features you use the most.

Change Inventory Part Numbers
Keep up with your vendors by updating part numbers at any time they change them.

Rename Jobs
Rename jobs at any time and ESC will update all transactions related to them so your reporting remains perfect.

Dashboard Flow Charts
New flowcharts have been added as tabs to the dashboard to make ESC easier to understand for new users.

Online Help
All help files have been moved online so you will always have the most up-to-date information when you need it.

Updated Employee Records

• You can now attach copies of important documents, reviews, etc. directly to an employee.
• Associate an employee in ESC with a Sales Rep in QuickBooks. This will flow over to all invoices that have the employee listed as a sales person.

Merchant Warehouse Integration
dESCO has teamed up with Merchant Warehouse to give you another option for processing credit cards. With the Merchant Warehouse integration no credit card data is stored in your office, making your computers instantly PCI compliant. The integration also features credit card authorization on all the mobile phone applications and even integrated card readers for Android devices.

ESC Accounting Upgrades

• All income statements have been enhanced to allow drilling down into the transactions that make up the totals shown on the report.
• Added a new Certified Payroll Report to help you stay compliant with jobs that require it.
• Created a new backload period that allows you to enter data in any screen without having it affect your financial statements.

The ACHR News has a great article in this week’s issue about how HVAC companies are adopting mobile technology to increase productivity and operational efficiency. John Hall’s article, Mobile Office Changes How HVAC Business Is Done, explores how “a company’s ability to access on-the-spot information is vital to working efficiently and professionally” and how new developments in mobile technology makes that possible.

The article is great, not just because it features dESCO’s app ESC Mobile, but also because it demonstrates the importance of implementing the right mobile technology in an HVAC company. Here are a few choice quotes from the article about what ESC Mobile is doing for HVAC companies:

“Our app appeals to and is accessible to everyone,” said Jonathan Frei of dESCO LLC. “First, the app appeals to the computer illiterate in its ease of use. Most people who are able to operate the basic built-in apps on their smart phone, like the calendar and contact manager, will be proficient with our app in a matter of minutes.”

[…]

Frei said the key is being able to connect with customers. “Connecting with customers is and always will be the most critical function of mobile technology for businesses,” he said. “Other connections, such as communications with the office, suppliers, and web data, are important, but only in so far as they enable better connections with customers. The measure of value for any new communication technology is how well it frees up your staff to pay attention to and spend time with your customers.

[…]

“In the past, if a technician needed a phone number, the service history on a customer, or a customer’s service agreement status, he would have to call the office and have someone look up the information and give it to him,” said Frei. With the advent of mobile computing, the tech can look it up himself, getting the information quicker and leaving the person in the office free to talk to customers or to do other important work.

“The technology is turning many two-person jobs into one-person jobs. Therefore, I am comfortable asserting the technology saves at least 50 percent of the time spent communicating work information,” Frei said.

You can read the full article on the ACHR News site here.

You can learn more about ESC Mobile for iPhone/iPad, Android or Windows Phone 7 on our site or you can try the app yourself by searching “ESC Mobile” in you phone’s app store.

It’s probably safe to say that two of the biggest expenses in running your service company are your technicians’ pay and the cost of maintaining your vehicles. Where are your techs all day? Are they being efficient with their time? Where are they going with your vehicles? How are they treating the vehicles you let them drive?

ESC management software is a powerful tool for managing a service company, helping with scheduling techs, invoicing customers, and managing service agreements. However, some of your company’s most valuable assets (and largest expenses) are your vehicles and the pay for the people driving them. To help lower costs and increase tech productivity, ESC integrates with SageQuest for real-time vehicle tracking, using mounted GPS units. This means you’ll always know where your vehicles are and how your techs are using them.

Below is a video where Jack Westenbarger of Acree Air Conditioning, Inc. discusses how he uses ESC and SageQuest to manage his company’s operations and assets:

[Can't see the video? Watch it here]

If you would like to learn more about how ESC and SageQuest work together to help service companies generate more revenue and lower costs, please join us and SageQuest for a live webinar on how the integration between the two programs can do just that.

We are conducting two webinars on the ESC/SageQuest integration on August 9 at 2 p.m. EDT and August 10 at 11:30 EDT. Sign up for either date to discover how GPS vehicle tracking can make your technicians more productive and save you money.

Sign up for the webinar on August 9 at 2 p.m. EDT

or  

Sign up for the webinar on August 10 at 11:30 EDT

We hope you will join us for this event.

The ESC Mobile Smartphone App makes service technicians more efficient in the field by providing them with all the information they need to get their jobs done. For you and your technicians, it means less paper work and more paid work!

You wouldn’t send one of your technicians to a job without the right tools or parts to finish the work. Give them the critical customer history information they need to make good decisions and to perform more efficiently in the field.

Our customers that have been using ESC Mobile have seen great leaps in the productivity of their technicians, in the ability to service their customers well, and in the accuracy of their payroll. If you want to see what our customers think of ESC Mobile, check out these customer testimonials in the video below:

ESC Mobile Customer Testimonials

ESC Mobile works with ESC Service Management Software to save service techs’ time with features including:

• Full dispatch information
• Get customer history, equipment, and service agreement information
• GPS tracking and mapping
• Real-time job status updates
• Create invoices and quotes
• Process payments
• Customer signature capture
• View documents from ESC
• Attach pictures from phone’s camera
• Add new customer equipment

For a quick snapshot of what ESC Mobile is all about, check out this 30-second overview video:

30-Second ESC Mobile Overview

ESC Mobile is available for the iPhone, Android phones, and Windows Phone 7. You can get the free demo version of the app from your phone’s app store by searching “ESC Mobile.” Try it on your phone today, and call me at 800-226-7529 to see how it can make your company and techs more efficient.