At Keith McDonald Plumbing these days, there’s a new business partner that does job scheduling and dispatching, virtually eliminates paperwork, generates invoices and collects credit card payment from customers out in the field, stores customer data, compiles estimates and more.
This do-it-all partner is Housecall Pro, a field service management system that has streamlined operations at the 20-year-old business based in Milledgeville, Georgia.
“Honestly, it’s the biggest lifesaver ever,” says owner Lindsay Goodson, daughter of the late Keith McDonald, who founded the company in 2002.
Before Housecall Pro, the company logged and scheduled jobs on spreadsheets, then posted them so that technicians could see their itinerary for the day. Moreover, technicians often forgot to submit invoices, which badly crimped cash flow. If they did submit invoices (with carbon copies, no less), their handwriting often was illegible, Goodson notes.
“It was horrible,” she says. “We were constantly going back to those spreadsheets to figure out who hadn’t turned in invoices. It’s impossible to pay bills when you aren’t invoicing customers quickly.”
But now, most customers get billed and pay for services rendered on the spot.
“All those spreadsheets finally are a thing of the past,” Goodson says. “Furthermore, we used to have five full-time office employees to keep up with everything. But now we employ just one full-time and two part-time office employees. And I can actually do what I need to do instead of chasing paperwork.”
Developed specifically for home services businesses, cloud-based Housecall Pro — which technicians access via a cellphone app — also offers other benefits. An add-on feature called Housecall Pro Assist automatically forwards calls that the company can’t answer to a call center where they’re handled by trained Housecall employees.
The system can also send text messages that notify customers when technicians are on their way, as well as a GPS link that shows where the technician is in real time. And when a job is completed, the system texts customers a link they can click on to provide online Google and Facebook reviews.
“We got more than 100 customer reviews posted online in just this past February alone,” Goodson says.
The system costs the company about $450 a month, plus another $1,800 a month for the call forwarding service.
“My dad never wanted to use a service like this because he felt it was just another expense,” Goodson says. “But for all the headaches it eliminates and how significantly it increases cash flow, it’s money well spent.”
Read more about Keith McDonald Plumbing in the June 2023 issue of Plumber magazine.
