Blog > Field service

Online appointment scheduling software: what benefits for field workers and your customers?

8 June 2021 | 6 min read

Scheduling an appointment with your customers or patients is not always easy. Availability, preferred time slots, working hours and absences of your agents, driving times and variable durations are all factors to take into account when scheduling an appointment. When making appointments by phone, taking these constraints into account is a real headache for your teams. Not to worry! Digital solutions are now available to make appointment scheduling easier.

What are the advantages of scheduling an appointment online?

If you haven’t yet made the switch to digital, you’ll quickly understand through this article that the benefits to your business are significant as soon as your customers start to prefer online booking over phone calls. These online appointment scheduling systems not only allow you to gain in productivity, but also to meet your customers’ expectations. Consumers appreciate the ability to make appointments anytime, anywhere and with the device of their choice. This is the feeling of autonomy they are looking for.

#1 Keep your customers updated

In a competitive environment, you need to stand out through the quality of your services, but also by offering a high quality customer service. Of course, this requires optimal communication, from their first contact to the end of the service. What’s the benefit? By providing a quality experience, your customers will continue to use your services. And that’s not all! They will also tend to share their experience with their friends and family.

Using an online appointment making system provides an exceptional experience for your customers. This includes keeping each of your customers updated after scheduling an appointment online. For example, email or SMS notification of booking confirmation and reminders to avoid missing appointments. You can also add a link that allows your customers to easily reschedule or cancel the appointment if necessary. This way, you avoid missed appointments and allow other clients to book the time slot that just became available.

Sending a message also makes it possible to communicate all the useful information for the customer: date of visit, time slot, scheduled arrival time, name of the field agent, duration of the service operation, etc.

#2 Gather customer feedback

What could be better than the feedback of your customers to improve the quality of your services? Today, you don’t need to contact your customers one by one to know if the appointment was successful. The appointment scheduling platforms do it for you. In concrete terms, they allow you to automate the sending of a message at the end of the visit, enabling the customer to evaluate the quality of service and add any suggestions for improvement.

#3 Manage multiple services

Some companies offer a multitude of services that require appointments with different durations, skills and resources. It is not always easy to manage all these constraints by hand… Well, using an online booking system allows you to set up all these factors in advance. This way, you eliminate waiting times and booking errors. You can be confident that the right field workers will be assigned to the right operations. In just a few seconds, the tool searches and proposes availabilities according to all these time constraints.

#4 Synchronize availabilities in real time

The use of an online appointment scheduling platform also allows you to avoid that unavailable time slots are booked. How is this possible? Well, the availabilities displayed on the appointment booking site, as well as on the platform designed for planners, are updated in real time.

#5 Increase productivity

To go even further, consider an online appointment scheduling system connected to a route optimization solution. These tools not only propose time slots according to the availability and the departure and arrival locations of the workers, but also take into account the geographical distance between customers and the appointments already scheduled.

In addition, you have the possibility to determine the maximum number of kilometers allowed from the departure address of an agent to propose a time slot.

Finally, by building optimized routes, your teams will be able to complete more visits on a daily basis, while eliminating unnecessary mileage.

The AntsRoute routing software which offers a 24/7 online appointment scheduling system.

#6 Suitable for any industry

If you’re considering switching to a digital solution to automate appointment scheduling, we have great news. These tools are usually applicable to any industry, regardless of the size of your business. Whether you’re a technician, a salesperson or a nurse, whether you work for a small business or a global organization, the system will meet your needs.

How to encourage your customers to schedule appointments online?

Add a booking button on the homepage of your website

In order to save time day-to-day, you need to encourage your customers to book appointments online instead of by phone. There is good news: there are simple ways to get your customers to switch from the phone to innovative online appointment scheduling solutions.

To get started, you can add an appointment button to your website in key pages. For example, on the home page, on the contact page and in the menu.

Highlight the option to book an appointment online in your emails

Your customers should know that you offer online booking. To do so, you can add a booking button or a link to your booking site in your emails. For example, in your email signature.

Add a QR code to your marketing materials

QR codes are a great way to allow your customers to easily access your online appointment making site from their smartphone. For example, if you install equipment at your customers’ homes, you can place a QR code on these devices. It is also possible to place a QR code on your business cards or billboards.

Which online appointment scheduling platform should you use for your business?

AntsRoute for field workers

AntsRoute is a French platform for planning and optimizing delivery and service operation routes. The solution also developped vientchezvous.com, a 24/7 online appointment booking system directly connected to AntsRoute. In concrete terms, the use of this platform makes customer management easy and schedules more appointments, while eliminating unnecessary mileage. In addition, the solution meets the needs of many industries: public health, medical diagnostics, oxygen therapy, people care, etc.

The main benefits of AntsRoute:

• Ability to define appointment types ;
• Ability to define time slots ;
• Management of the availabilities and working hours of field agents ;
• Taking into account of kilometers and travel time ;
• Ability to customize the display of the booking site to match your brand image ;
• Available on any device (computer, tablet, smartphone) ;
• Real-time update of availabilities ;
• Overview of field workers’ schedules ;
• Automated notifications sent to customers via SMS or email ;
• iOS and Android mobile application allowing field agents to follow their routes ;
• System for gathering proof of completion with customer signature, comments and photos ;
• Automated sending of service reports ;
• Ability to get customer feedback ;
• Integrations with other applications, API Rest and webhooks.

To evaluate the quality of the online appointment making platform for field workers, we invite you to carry out an AntsRoute 7-day trial. Go here to take advantage of this free trial without commitment.

Doctolib for medical practitioners in office

Doctolib no longer needs to prove its worth… Founded in 2013, it is THE online consultation management platform for office-based healthcare practitioners. The tool comes with a system that allows patients to book appointments online.

The main benefits of doctolib :

• Possibility to define types of services ;
• Management of the availability and working hours of health practitioners ;
• Available on any device (computer, tablet, smartphone) ;
• Automated appointment reminders by email and SMS ;
• Possibility of gathering feedback from patients ;
• Creation of a custom professional profile on the site with photos, location, pricing, etc. ;
• Teleconsultation system ;
• Online sharing of prescriptions and documents ;
• Quicker invoicing and remote transmission.