Do you suffer from a high number of engineer call-outs? Are looking for a way to reduce this? Or are your engineer reports suggesting there isn’t a problem with a product, but perhaps a misdiagnosis?
Soft support is an easy way to rectify this and help you to rethink engineer visits. In this article we look at the benefits of soft support and how it can tie into your business practices.
What is soft support?
Soft support refers to support you can provide your customers without the need of an engineer visit or repair. This can include things such resetting your device or carrying out basic maintenance checks with a support agent over the phone, or a customer using a online support portal.
Cost-effectiveness
Offering soft support options is more cost-effective than sending an engineer to repair a product. This is because the support can be done by guiding the customer without the need to pay for an engineer, travel costs, and additional equipment.
Sometimes suspected ‘faults’ might not even be an actual problem, but rather something the customer is unfamiliar with. Soft support allows the customer to be educated on features without the need for a call-out. This means that as a company you can introduce soft support to reduce your costs.
Time efficiency
Soft support can also enable you to provide quicker resolutions for your customers. Without the need to wait for an engineer, you can provide customers access to immediate resolutions for their problems. In effect, it leaves your customers with less stress, and they can be confident they can get help in the future too.
Accessibility
When looking at support options, we should always think about accessibility. Some locations may not be as accessible as others, such as remote locations. Soft support is a way of overcoming this as it allows your customer to access help without the physical attendance of an engineer. This accessibility is also achieved by using multiple platforms for customers to use, such as live chats and online guides.
Scalability
Another reason to rethink engineer visits is by looking at the scale of bookings. If you’re finding your engineer bookings are stretched to accommodate a large area and large volume of customers, it is time to look at soft support.
This is because soft support can be delivered in various forms remotely via phone support, email, live chat, and online guides. This means that customers can access these with ease, and you do not need to worry about cancelling appointments or rescheduling visits to ensure all of your customers are visited.
Environmental and financial impact
As we like to focus on the environment, we must not forget that reducing the need for so many engineer visits can positively impact the environment. This is because it reduces unnecessary travel for engineers, from visits which could be resolved with customers over the phone, meaning lower emissions from vehicles. This also provides a financial impact as it reduces the cost of unnecessary engineer call outs as well as saving the cost of fuel for the appointments.
We still need our engineers!
Of course, there are times when an engineer visit is absolutely necessary, and in those scenarios, it is appropriate to book. At TMTI, we like to make sure we do all that is possible for a customer before an engineer is called out. As ultimately it is more convenient for a customer to get the issue resolved on a phone call rather than wait for a visit. Soft support can still help to diagnose these issues and ensure that if an engineer is booked, the engineer has as much information from our team beforehand so that they can fix any problems as quickly as possible.
At TMTI, we can offer a variety of soft support service options to reduce the costs of engineer visits. These can be tailored to your products and customer needs.
For more on the services we can offer, click here.
