Part 10: AI in your industry, and on the floor

Where does AI help an HVAC or plumbing company?

Written lesson · about 3 minutes to read

The short answer

AI helps an HVAC or plumbing company at four points: the after-hours call booked, the day's dispatch proposed, the quote drafted from your own price book at the customer's table, and the right parts on the van. The dispatcher and the tech still make the calls.

Three things to remember

01An AI answerer can book the after-hours call, but it must say it is automated.
02Quotes drafted from your own price book close at the kitchen table, and the tech presents them.
03The dispatcher decides the day, and truck stock only works if techs scan what they use.

The call at seven at night

A homeowner with no heat at seven in the evening calls three numbers and books with the first that answers. An AI answerer can pick up at once, say plainly that it is an automated assistant, and gather what a dispatcher would: the address, the equipment, the symptom and whether anyone is at risk. It checks the calendar, offers the first real slot and confirms by text.

In the morning the dispatcher arrives to a list of booked calls with the details already in the system, not a voicemail queue. Start with after hours only, review a week of its calls, then decide whether it should answer in the daytime too.

Dispatch, proposed

Which tech, in which order, with which parts. Tools that propose the day's route against skills, location, priority and the parts on board are mature, and an AI layer makes them easy to question, such as who could take a call in the north end at two. When a job overruns, it proposes the reshuffle.

The dispatcher decides. The dispatcher knows the customer who will only have the tech who fixed it last time, the new hire who should not go to a commercial job alone, and the tech having a bad week. None of that is in the system. Read the draft before it goes to the trucks, because tools can chase miles when the customer wanted the morning.

The quote at the kitchen table

The tech describes the fix in plain words, or photographs the nameplate and the failed part. The tool looks up your price book, pulls the last similar jobs and drafts a quote on the tablet with the options you always offer, such as repair, replace and a maintenance plan. The tech changes what needs changing and presents it. A quote given at the table tends to close; one emailed days later competes with others.

The rule is that the price comes from the book at the moment of the quote, never from anything the tool remembered. The tech still owns the number the customer hears and the read on whether they want the cheap fix or the right one.

Parts on the van

The tech opens the panel and the capacitor is the one size not on the van. Back to the shop, back to the job, two hours gone. A tool can keep a live count for each truck, look at tomorrow's booked calls and the parts those jobs usually need, and print a pick list for each van tonight.

It all depends on the count being real, which means techs scanning what they use. That is a habit, not a feature, and it is why truck stock projects often fail. Make scanning the fastest motion possible, and check the count against a real van once a month.

Where to start this week

Count how many calls come in after five and how many get a callback the same night. Before any tool takes a call, write down its stop points: it never quotes a price, diagnoses or promises a technician by a time nobody has confirmed, and a caller who mentions a gas smell goes to a person or your own emergency script.

Also count last month's second trips for a part and the hours each took. Then check what the service software you already pay for can do, since it may already propose dispatch or draft quotes. Add one piece at a time, with a person checking each result.

Next lessonWhere does AI help a field service business?

More in part 10

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