KPIs for a field service team: the figures for every day, week and month
Everyone is busy, the phone is ringing, the technicians are on the road. But how much work is still waiting for a date, what is finished but not yet invoiced, and where is it getting stuck? A handful of figures, looked at at the right moment, tells you more than a dashboard full of charts.
Published by Abdelhay Rahou (opens in a new window)5 November 20265 min read
A KPI is a question with an action
A key figure is only useful if you know which question it answers and what you do when it is not right. A figure that prompts nobody to act can go. That is why this article groups the figures by the rhythm at which you look at them: what calls for a decision every morning, what you adjust every week, and what you assess every month.
Every day: what has to happen today?
| Figure | The question | The action |
|---|---|---|
| Still to schedule | How much work has no technician or time yet? | Schedule it, urgent interventions first |
| Overdue | Which interventions are past their deadline? | Tell the customer and reschedule |
| Blocked by parts | Which interventions in the coming days are missing a part? | Order, reserve or move |
| Available technicians | Who can still take something on today? | Assign an urgent call |
| To invoice | Which finished work is not yet on an invoice? | Invoice while everything is fresh |
Those five figures take a few minutes every morning. They point to a list, and the list points to the work.
Every week: is the work moving?
- Completed interventions: how much work was finished this week, per technician and per type (maintenance, breakdown, other work)? You explain a drop, and a rise too: a busy week of breakdowns pushes out the scheduled maintenance.
- Hours worked and billable hours per technician: a big difference between the two is worth a question. Is it travel, internal work, or work that was not charged?
- Overdue work per technician: who has interventions past their deadline, and is that technician’s schedule realistic?
- Reports not yet signed or sent: an intervention without a signed report is harder to invoice and to defend if the customer has a question.
Every month: what does it bring in?
- Service revenue and invoiced amount: the month’s invoices, excluding VAT, compared with the previous month. Watch the difference between an amount with and without credit notes deducted.
- Interventions per type: which share of the work is maintenance from contracts, which share breakdowns? That determines how predictable your schedule is.
- Working time per intervention: the average working time, possibly per type of work. A rise can point to more difficult installations, missing information or a training need.
- Most used parts: what must always be in the van or in the warehouse?
- Customers with the most interventions: who asks for the most work, and is that work in a contract or a separate intervention each time?
And MTBF, MTTR or first-time fix?
In industrial maintenance, you often hear about three other KPIs:
- MTBF (mean time between failures): the average time between two breakdowns of an installation.
- MTTR (mean time to repair): the average time to repair a breakdown.
- First-time fix: the share of interventions resolved at the first visit.
They are useful, but they need data that is recorded consistently: per installation, per breakdown and per visit. Start with the figures above, which come from your everyday work, and only add an industrial KPI once you know where the data will come from.
Short video · 0:30
Iedereen druk bezig, maar wie heeft het overzicht?
Wat nog in te plannen is, wat afgerond is en wat te factureren is, in één oogopslag. Eén klik opent de juiste lijst.
Video in Dutch, with Dutch captions
All short videos (in Dutch)How it works in Digitalnatie Service Suite
The service overview is the home screen after logging in.
- Today’s figures: the total of today’s interventions, the work still to schedule, the overdue interventions, the interventions blocked by missing parts within the next 7 days, the available technicians and the work to invoice. Each figure opens the list behind it.
- Per technician: one drop-down list limits the counters, the schedule and the urgent items to one technician.
- Per role: each role gets its own layout, which everyone can adjust for themselves. Anyone allowed to see amounts gets the month’s net invoiced amount, after credit notes.
For the week and the month, there are the reports:
- periods of 7, 30 or 90 days, 12 months or a custom period, with a comparison with the previous period;
- completed interventions, billable hours and, for those who can see amounts, service revenue;
- interventions per week and per type, hours per technician, the average working time per intervention, the most used parts and the customers with the most interventions, filterable by technician, customer or type;
- per technician, the interventions, the hours worked and billable hours and the overdue work, with a CSV export.
Only those with the permission for it can see the amounts. First-time fix is not recorded today: the report shows that no data is available for it. More on the work behind the figures in planning and invoicing.
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between hours worked and billable hours?
Hours worked are all the working time recorded by a technician. Billable hours are the part you charge to a customer under your agreements. The difference includes internal work, for example, and depending on your rates, travel too.
How many KPIs should I track?
As few as you need to make the right decisions every week. A figure that prompts nobody to act can come off the dashboard.
Does Service Suite measure first-time fix?
Not today. In the report, that figure shows that no data is available, because it is not recorded.
Can everyone see the revenue figures?
No. The amounts and the revenue are only visible to roles with financial permissions. A figure that a role may not see is shown as not available for that role.