Dynamics 365 – 2021 Release Wave 1 | Part 3

It’s that time of year again! Starting February 3rd we are able to get early access to some of the new features and updates in Dynamics 365 and the Power Platform! I am writing a series of articles on what is new and what is coming in this release. Previously I wrote an article on generic features and updates for Dynamics 365 Sales which you can read here, and an article on what’s new for Dynamics 365 Customer service which you can find here.

In this article I will be discussing updates and enhancements for Dynamics 365 Field Service. Just for the folks who are not familiar with the release cadence, Microsoft Power Platform and Customer Engagement apps (Dynamics 365 Sales, Dynamics 365 Customer Service, Dynamics 365 Field Service, Dynamics 365 Marketing, and Dynamics 365 Project Service Automation) deliver two major releases per year which occur in April and October. These releases offer new capabilities and added functionality. Since these releases include features that affect the user experience, you can opt in for early access to try out and test some of these features. Click here to see the early access features for this release.

Work Order Resolution Details

Work order resolutions allow Field Service organizations to track how a work order was resolved. This feature allows us to track multiple resolutions for a work order which in turn provides field service managers with insights allowing them to better understand customer work orders and incident trends. There are two new entities added to Dynamics 365:

• Resolutions: This table represents the actual resolution. Users with the right privileges can create resolution records.
• Work Order Resolutions: This table has a N:1 relationship with the resolutions table and the work order table. This is the record that will be created by the technician to tie an existing resolution to a work order. (image below)

Account Address Usability

If you open the account form in the field service app, it looks like all of the fields related to the service address are now showing in one field called ‘service address’. It reminds me a little of the composite fields we had for address fields. This takes up less space on the form and makes it easier to read. You can now remove the individual address fields from the form and clean up the form a bit.
When I opened the account form in the classic designer to investigate I noticed this is a control that has been added to the ‘address1_line1’ field. The name of the control is ‘Address input(preview)‘ and when you click on it you’ll notice there are some configuration options available.
I also tried adding this control to the ‘address2_line1’ field, but when I tried to add the control unfortunately it wasn’t available in the controls list….
Let’s get back to the user perspective. When you are on the account form and click on the edit icon next to the ‘service address’ field, a window will pop open showing all the individual address fields. From here a user can update the fields and save the changes.

Knowledge management articles

I really like this one! This feature enables knowledge articles on the field service mobile app which means that field technicians will now have access to the knowledge articles in Dynamics 365! This totally makes sense to me and honestly I am a bit disappointed that I didn’t think of this one! One of the first questions that I had about this was, are these articles going to be available offline? I mean what if a technician is in an area with bad or no internet connection? They would need to be able to access these articles? The answer is yes. Obviously you’ll need to make sure the offline profiles for your technicians are configured correctly, but this functionality is included. What about the ability to link an article to a work order? Yes! Besides the ability to search and read knowledge articles, technicians can now link these articles directly to a work order. On top of that, they can even create new knowledge articles as well! Great feature Microsoft, I’m impressed!

Enhancements to the new schedule board

I can’t help it but it feels like unwrapping gifts at Christmas as I go through the list of new features! There are a bunch of updates to the new schedule board (you know, the new one that got introduced to us in the last wave). Two new schedule board views have been added and I have to say this new design looks amazing! It’s so much easier to read the data on the screen and it just looks sharp! We can now view the map on the new schedule board as well. I have to say I really like the way the map shows on the new schedule board, but I am missing the ability to drag an unscheduled requirement from the map onto the schedule board… I hope that’s coming back.. Lastly, the resource cards (ding ding ding!!) are back as well. I’m sure you’re familiar with this functionality, but if not: these cards shows information about the resource. In order to bring up the card from the schedule board, right click on a resource and click ‘View Resource Card’. Contact information, skills and roles can be viewed directly from this card.

Those were all the enhancements and new features that were enabled for early access, but now let’s look at the features that are coming in April 2021 and beyond.

Customer Self Service Scheduling

Keep in mind I don’t have a lot of information on this because this was not something I was able to test myself, but I think it’s good to know that this is something that is coming. The ability for customer to self schedule will be available from a Power Apps portal. Customers will be able to view multiple available slots for the work to be performed, depending on resource availability. They will be able to select a specific timeslot to schedule the work.

Simplifying Work Order Adoption

This feature will have a self-guided adoption experience to create a work order. This means there will be a guided step by step process that will allow users to quickly create work orders without having to go through the various settings and fields that are required today. Microsoft is simplifying the core field service tasks in the application.

Simplifying Resource Setup

This will be another guided step by step experience that will simplify the setup and configuration of resources (Field Service mobile users). In a few steps admins will be able to add users to the system and create a full field service mobile profile for them.

Appointments Data Included in Resource Scheduling

This means that the scheduling engine will look at a resource’s bookings and appointments in Dynamics 365 when trying to determine a resource’s availability. Just like bookings are today, appointments in Dynamics 365 will be considered ‘booked time’. The appointments will also be visible on the schedule board so that dispatchers have full visibility.

Export Inspections Responses to PDF

This is a feature we’ve been waiting for! Previously we were able to navigate to an inspection and just export the questions to a PDF file, but in this release we will now be able to export the questions and the responses of an inspection to a PDF file directly from the work order service task! This feature is available from the browser and also from the mobile app. Users will see the a button called ‘export responses’ on the command bar of the work order service task the inspection is related to. Keep in mind that this feature doesn’t support custom date or number formats using the personalization settings. It also doesn’t support right to left languages nor does it support Asian languages at this time.

Import and export inspection templates

System admins can now move inspections from one environment to another. Users will see the ‘Export’ button on the top of the command bar on an inspection record. When the button is clicked there are two different buttons to choose from: ‘export to PDF’ and ‘export to json’. The admin needs to click the ‘export to json’ button in order to export the inspection. When importing the inspection into another environment they will need to navigate to settings in the field service app, then select ‘Inspections’. On the top of the command bar they will see the ‘Import from json’ button which can be used to import the inspection.

Technician Locator

The technician locater will live inside a Power Apps portal and at this time can’t be used in a custom (ISV) portal. Reminders can be scheduled using Power Automate. These reminders can be sent through email or SMS. (Keep in mind you’ll need an SMS provider to send SMS notifications) On the day of the scheduled service, notifications can be sent to the customer. They will also be able to track the resource’s progress to the destination in real time. This feature will be in preview starting late February. I am planning to write a separate article about this feature next week.

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