Introduction
Many organizations perform service-based activities for their customers, such as repairs, health and beauty services, or product installations. Depending on the organization, workers can be dispatched into the field to perform work. Often, the services are performed at their service locations. For example, as a customer, you might take a pet to the groomers, take in an automobile for service, need a piece of clothing altered, or request an aftermarket item to be installed. Regardless of the service model that an organization uses, they need to identify their available resources and schedule them to perform a service.
The organization that provides the services needs to implement those services in the most effective manner possible. This requirement involves scheduling and performing the service in a timely manner. Furthermore, you need to ensure that whoever performs the service is qualified and has the accurate equipment to do the job. Regardless of the technician's skill level, they won't be able to complete the service without the necessary equipment.
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Service helps organizations to effectively schedule services for their customers through its Customer Service scheduling feature. This feature uses the Universal Resource Scheduling solution from Dynamics 365. The solution helps organizations schedule resources for any scenario, such as scheduling a resource to complete a task or to note items on their schedule, such as service activities and work orders.
With Customer Service scheduling, organizations can efficiently identify and fulfill scheduling requirements. When a service needs to be scheduled, the system will examine what is needed to complete the service, such as the amount of time required, the necessary facilities and equipment, and the resources. Then, the system will provide multiple scheduling options so that the scheduler can identify the best time based on the organization's current workloads. Schedulers don't need to work in different resource schedules to ensure that no one is being double-booked. Customer Service scheduling will consider items that technicians are already scheduled for and will only suggest resources who are truly available to perform the service.
Overview of Customer Service scheduling
During the scheduling process, you should know what needs to be done and what is needed to accomplish the task. Customer Service scheduling uses two key components to help you define what needs to be scheduled and for which customer, including helping you define the required resources to complete the task:
Services - Represents what the organization is providing to their customers. A service might be an oil change for an automotive company or a hair color treatment for a salon. The service record defines how many resources of a specific type would be needed to complete the task. For example, an oil change might require one technician and one service bay.
Service activities - Activity record that represents the delivery and implementation of a service to a customer. Service activities include details such as which service is to be delivered and what customer it's for.
Services and service activities are used conjointly. For example, an auto service center that wants to deliver oil changes to customers might use the following process to set up the service:
Create oil change service - Service would specify the type and quantities of resources that are required to deliver an oil change.
Important
The service only defines what type or resources that are required to complete it. It does not specify who will deliver the service.
Create a service activity - The Oil Change service is added to the service activity as the service that will be provided. The service activity record also contains extra details, such as the customer whom the activity is being created for and where the activity will take place.
Schedule the service activity - When a service activity is scheduled, the system examines the resource requirements for the attached service (such as Oil Change) and then identifies which qualified people, facilities, and equipment resources are available to complete the service activity.
Schedule service activities
Note
Customer Service scheduling uses Universal Resource Scheduling to schedule service activities, which is the base scheduling solution that allows organizations to schedule and dispatch items. It provides the core scheduling functionality and is the key component in Microsoft Dynamics 365 solutions that use scheduling capabilities such as Dynamics 365 Customer Service and Dynamics 365 Field Service.
The three primary record types that you can use to schedule an item are:
Service activity
Resource requirement
Bookable resource booking
Service activity
When a resource needs to perform a service for a customer, you can create a service activity in Dynamics 365. The service activity typically includes information that will affect how it is scheduled.
A service activity typically includes items such as:
The service that is being provided.
The customer whom the work is being done for.
Preferences for service delivery, such as time windows, preferred technician, and so on.
Resource requirement
After you have created the service activity, you can create a resource requirement. You can use the resource requirement record to schedule the item in the system. It defines the specific details that are required to schedule the record. Moreover, you can use the requirement record to locate qualified resources who meet the requirement.
Requirements for a service activity might include:
The type or resource that is needed.
The service center where the resource should be located.
Resource preferences.
Other relevant scheduling information, such as if you want to schedule less busy technicians first.
Bookable resource bookings
After a resource requirement is scheduled, you can create a bookable resource booking, which provides the specific details around the resource who is responsible for completing the service activity.
A resource booking for a resource requirement would include:
The resource (person) who is responsible for completing the service.
Estimated versus actual times and status-related information.
Total time spent working on the item.
Customer Service scheduling component overview
Dynamics 365 Customer Service Hub includes an area that organizations can use for scheduling purposes. You can access the hub through the Scheduling area.
Note
You can also access the Scheduling area in the Customer Service workspace app.
Customer Service scheduling components are divided into three areas:
Scheduling - Use this area to set up items like resources, facilities/equipment, resource categories, services, and fulfillment preferences.
Tools - Represents the schedule board that is used for manually scheduling resources.
Settings - Use this area to set up supporting scheduling components, such as organizational units and business closures.
Scheduling area
The Scheduling area contains the following components:
Resources - Defines the specific people, facilities, or equipment that you can schedule to work on items. Resources could represent internal employees, external contractors, facilities, or equipment. After you have defined your resources, you can associate them with the services that you provide to your customers.
Services - Represents the services that your organization provides to customers. The service record defines the resource types and number of resources that are required to complete it. For example, winterizing a personal watercraft might require one marine technician and a personal watercraft lift.
Service Activities - Activity record that represents the delivery and implementation of a service to a customer. Service activities include details such as which service is to be delivered and the customer whom the service is for.
Facilities/Equipment - Defines facilities and equipment that might need to be scheduled as part of a service activity. For example, a facility record would be created to represent a service bay or specialized equipment that is used to complete a job. After you have defined facilities and equipment, you can create resources that represent those items and then associate them with facilities/equipment records.
Resource Categories - Define the different roles or categories that resources might have in an organization. For example, an organization might create resource categories for positions like developer, consultant, or project manager.
Fulfillment Preferences - Customizable entities that let you choose how schedule assistant results are displayed, such as hourly appointments or morning and afternoon time windows. For example, by default, available resources are based on their earliest available time, such as 10:39 AM. With Fulfillment Preferences set to Hourly, the same resource's availability shows as 11:00 AM. This approach simplifies the scheduler's process of viewing and understanding availability and then communicating this information to the customer.
Tools area
The Tools area contains the Scheduling component, or the schedule board, which is an interactive calendar that you can use to schedule specific resources for different items. You can filter the schedule board as needed, and you can view it as a map to help make scheduling items easier.
Settings area
The Settings area contains the following components:
Organizational Units - Represent containers that you can use to group resources together. Organizational units might represent a location that you can dispatch resources out of, or you can use them to group resources based on a region or service center.
Business Closures - Specifies when an organization is not open, such as holidays.
Install Customer Service scheduling
Customer Service scheduling should be available within Customer Service Hub for new environments. If you have an older installation and can't find the Scheduling area in the app, go to Microsoft Power Platform admin center, expand the Resources area, and then select Dynamics 365 apps.
If the Dynamics 365 Service Scheduling component isn't installed, you can select the ellipsis (...) next to it and install the component into your Dynamics 365 environment.
Security roles
Four security roles are associated with Customer Service scheduling. Two of the following roles were previously associated with legacy service scheduling, which has been replaced with Customer Service scheduling powered by Universal Resource Scheduling.
Scheduler Manager - Set up and manage the service scheduling experience, and access and set up all service scheduling tables.
Scheduler - Create and schedule legacy service activities.
Customer Service Schedule Administrator - Manage the service scheduling in Universal Resource Scheduling.
Customer Service Scheduler - Create and schedule service activities in Universal Resource Scheduling.
Important
To ensure that all scheduler managers are able to set up the scheduling experience and access the scheduling tables, you need to assign the Customer Service Schedule Administrator and the Schedule Manager security roles.