Drive time is your biggest hidden cost. Here’s how to see it.
Most field service companies lose more hours to driving than to anything else, and almost none of them measure it.
Ask a dispatcher how much time their crews spend driving and you’ll get a shrug. Ask the technicians and you’ll get a number, usually a big one. In the companies we work with, drive time is typically 25 to 35% of a technician’s paid day.
Why it hides
Drive time isn’t a line on any report. It’s buried in overtime, in jobs that run late, and in the second trip across town to pick up a part.
Three ways to see it this week
- Compare each tech’s first and last job location with home or the yard.
- Count how many times a day crews cross the same highway.
- Look at the jobs that were added after 9 a.m., and where the tech was when they got them.
Once you can see it, the fix is usually simple: group jobs by area, and place urgent calls with the tech who’s already nearby.