Fire Technician Efficiency: Tips to Streamline Inspections & Service Visits

Finding ways to be more efficient in the field can be a challenge. Fire technicians face challenges in every area of operations that can lead to frustration and slow them down. Whether the schedule is inefficient and requires them to drive across town and back or they don’t have the right information and tools at their disposal, inefficiencies can lead to major problems. Not only do you reduce the frustrations facing your technicians, but you ensure they can provide the highest level of service to your customers–and that keeps everyone happy.

Efficiency Starts with Being Prepared

Efficiency in the field starts at the office. Scheduling is the first step to effective time management for technicians as they move from job to job. Efficient scheduling is centered on time and location. Office staff should determine how long each job should take based on the number of buildings, the size of the facility, the systems that need to be inspected, and the inspections that need to be completed. Additionally, staff should consider where each visit for the day is located. With Inspect Point’s scheduling and dispatching tools, staff can review critical information about each visit and technicians’ schedules on the Scheduling Dashboard and the Scheduling Map, so location can be factored in and the schedule can be as efficient as possible.

Another way all employees should work together to ensure preparedness is in inventory management. Do techs have the equipment to complete the inspections or service visits on their schedule? Is their truck stocked and ready to go? Keeping track of equipment, loaner extinguishers, and other key items ensures techs have everything they need when they arrive on-site to complete jobs efficiently and accurately.

Clarity & Communication

When fire technicians know what’s coming at each visit, they’re set up for success–and efficiency. Inspect Point provides access to historical inspection and service data for each account, facility, or building to help techs know what to look out for and ensure they have the necessary details to complete the inspection or work order.

Regular and easy communication between techs and office staff on scheduling, emergency work orders, and the specific needs of different customers or buildings, help streamline work in the field. Effectively preparing technicians ahead of time means they can focus on the inspection without having to pause and confirm various details throughout the visit. It’s also essential that communication with your customers is clear and consistent. Inspect Point allows you to set building- and account-level contacts so techs always know who to contact. And you can make sure customers are always ready for you with automated visit reminders and access to key documents through the Customer Portal.

When it comes time to actually execute the inspection or the service visit, make sure your fire technicians have the tools they need to do so efficiently and effectively.

Tools that Support Technician Efficiency

When it comes time to actually execute the inspection or the service visit, make sure your fire technicians have the tools they need to do so efficiently and effectively. Inspect Point ensures technicians always have the right forms for each inspection. Forms auto-populate for recurring inspections, saving techs time searching for and loading the correct documents. Our pre-loaded, code-compliant question sets help techs stay on track and ensure nothing falls through the cracks as they go through each inspection.

Once the inspection is completed, techs can instantly generate code-compliant reports and send it back to the office for review or directly to the customer. When they identify deficiencies, technicians can easily create a proposal while still in the field, linking to those deficiencies and streamlining the service process. If they make any quick fixes to a system during an inspection, they can easily document and add them to the customer’s invoice.

And if the customer’s facility or building is too far from a reliable Internet connection, Inspect Point still allows techs to access the information they need. Technicians can download the necessary forms ahead of time to make sure everything is accessible on site, regardless of Internet availability.

You can support your fire technicians and help them improve efficiency with simple steps that set them–and ultimately, your customers–up for success. Focus on efficient operations that start at the office, good communication across the board, and equipping techs with tools that take care of tedious tasks so they can focus on what they do best.