Field Service Glossary

After-Hours Dispatch

After-hours dispatch is the process of handling emergency service calls that come in outside normal business hours, typically evenings, weekends, and holidays.

Dispatch

Dispatch is the process of assigning field technicians to service calls and routing them to customer locations in the most efficient order.

Dispatcher

A dispatcher is the person or role responsible for assigning service calls to field technicians and keeping the daily schedule on track.

Fleet Tracking

Fleet tracking is the use of GPS devices in company vehicles to monitor location, speed, idle time, and driving behavior in real time.

GPS Dispatch

GPS dispatch uses real-time vehicle location data to assign the closest qualified technician to each new service call.

On-Call Technician

An on-call technician is a field service worker assigned to respond to emergency calls during evenings, weekends, or holidays on a rotating schedule.

Route Optimization

Route optimization is the practice of sequencing a technician's daily stops to minimize total drive time and fuel cost.

Service Call

A service call is a single customer request for a technician to come onsite, diagnose an issue, and perform repair or maintenance work.

Time on Site

Time on site is the total minutes a technician spends at a customer's location from arrival to departure on a single job.

Backlog

Backlog is the total dollar value or labor hours of work that has been sold but not yet scheduled or completed.

Emergency Service

Emergency service is urgent repair work that cannot wait for normal scheduling, typically involving health, safety, or property damage risks.

First-Call Resolution

First-call resolution is the percentage of service calls that are fully fixed on the technician's first visit, with no return trip required.

Maintenance Plan

A maintenance plan is a customer-facing product that bundles routine inspections, discounts, and priority scheduling into a single recurring purchase.

Membership Plan

A membership plan gives customers priority service, discounts, and perks in exchange for a monthly or annual fee.

Planned Maintenance Agreement

A planned maintenance agreement is a contract where a customer pays a recurring fee in exchange for scheduled inspections and tune-ups of their equipment.

Recurring Service Agreement

A recurring service agreement is a contract that auto-renews and bills a customer on a fixed schedule for ongoing maintenance or priority service.

Scheduling Window

A scheduling window is the block of time, usually 2 to 4 hours, during which a technician is expected to arrive at a customer's location.

Service Agreement

A service agreement is a written contract between a contractor and customer that defines the scope, price, and terms of ongoing service work.

Smart Scheduling

Smart scheduling uses automation to assign jobs based on technician skill, location, parts availability, and priority instead of manual dispatcher judgment alone.

Technician Utilization Rate

Technician utilization rate is the percentage of a tech's paid hours that are actually billed to customers as productive work.

Callback

A callback is a return trip to a customer's location to fix work that was not completed correctly on a previous visit.

Change Order

A change order is a written amendment to an existing contract that adjusts scope, price, or timeline after the work has started.

Diagnostic Fee

A diagnostic fee is a flat charge a service company bills to come onsite, inspect the problem, and provide a repair quote.

Field Report

A field report is the written summary a technician completes after a job documenting what was found, what was done, and what the customer should know.

Job Folder

A job folder is a digital or physical collection of every document related to a single job, including quotes, photos, invoices, signatures, and notes.

Price Book

A price book is a standardized catalog of labor and material tasks with pre-set flat rate prices that technicians use in the field.

Punch List

A punch list is a final checklist of small remaining items that must be completed before a project or job can be officially closed out.

Tech Ratio

Tech ratio is the number of field technicians a single office support person, such as a dispatcher or CSR, can effectively manage.

Truck Stock

Truck stock is the inventory of parts, tools, and materials a technician carries on their service vehicle to complete common jobs without a supply house trip.

Warranty Work

Warranty work is labor or parts replacement performed at no cost to the customer because the issue is covered under a prior repair, install, or manufacturer warranty.

Work Order

A work order is the digital or paper document that authorizes and records the work performed on a specific service call.

Cost Plus

Cost plus is a pricing model where the customer pays the contractor's actual costs plus a fixed percentage or fee as profit.

Credit Memo

A credit memo is a document that reduces or reverses a previously issued invoice, typically for returns, refunds, or billing corrections.

Deposit Invoice

A deposit invoice is an initial bill that collects a portion of the total job cost before work begins, typically to cover materials and secure the customer's commitment.

Estimate

An estimate is a written offer of price and scope that a contractor provides to a customer before beginning any work.

Final Invoice

A final invoice is the last bill on a job, showing the total amount due after applying any deposits and progress payments already collected.

Flat Rate Pricing

Flat rate pricing charges a fixed amount for a specific task, regardless of how long the technician actually takes to complete it.

Invoice

An invoice is a billing document that lists the work performed, parts used, and total amount due from the customer.

Invoice Aging

Invoice aging is a report that groups unpaid invoices by how many days they are past due, typically in buckets of 0-30, 31-60, 61-90, and 90-plus.

Net 30

Net 30 is a payment term that gives the customer 30 calendar days from the invoice date to pay the full amount due.

Payment Terms

Payment terms are the written rules that define when and how a customer must pay for services rendered.

Progress Billing

Progress billing is the practice of invoicing the customer in stages as work is completed on a long project, rather than waiting until the end.

Time and Materials

Time and materials is a pricing model where the customer pays for actual labor hours worked plus the cost of parts used, usually with a markup.

Accounts Payable

Accounts payable is the total amount of money a business owes to its suppliers and vendors for goods and services already received but not yet paid for.

Accounts Receivable

Accounts receivable is the total amount of money owed to a business by customers for services already delivered but not yet paid.

Billable Hours

Billable hours are the portion of a technician's paid time that is actually invoiced to customers as productive service work.

Burdened Labor Rate

Burdened labor rate is a technician's true hourly cost after adding payroll taxes, benefits, and other employment overhead on top of base wages.

Chargeback

A chargeback is a forced reversal of a credit card payment initiated by the customer's bank, usually because the customer disputes the charge.

Cost of Goods Sold

Cost of goods sold, or COGS, is the direct cost of labor and materials required to deliver the services you billed, excluding overhead.

Customer Financing

Customer financing offers homeowners a loan or payment plan to cover a large repair or replacement, turning a single big invoice into monthly payments.

Days Sales Outstanding

Days sales outstanding, or DSO, is the average number of days it takes a business to collect payment after an invoice has been issued.

Effective Hourly Rate

Effective hourly rate is total billed revenue divided by total paid hours, revealing what each tech is actually earning the business per clock hour.

Gross Margin

Gross margin is revenue minus the direct cost of labor and materials, expressed as a percentage of revenue.

Interchange Fee

An interchange fee is the portion of a credit card processing fee that the merchant pays to the card-issuing bank on every transaction.

Job Costing

Job costing is the practice of tracking every labor, material, and overhead cost tied to a specific job so you can measure its true profitability.

Job Profitability

Job profitability is the measure of how much actual profit a single job generated after all direct costs and allocated overhead are subtracted from the billed revenue.

Kaldr Protocol Pricing

Kaldr Protocol pricing is a disciplined approach to building field service rates from burdened labor cost, overhead allocation, and target gross margin instead of copying competitors.

Labor Burden

Labor burden is the total cost of employing a technician beyond base wages, including payroll taxes, benefits, insurance, uniforms, and workers' compensation.

Merchant Account

A merchant account is a specialized bank account that allows a business to accept credit and debit card payments from customers.

Net Margin

Net margin is the percentage of revenue that remains as profit after all operating expenses, taxes, and interest are paid.

Non-Billable Time

Non-billable time is any hour a technician is paid for but is not invoiced to a customer, including drive time, shop time, training, and idle time.

Overhead Allocation

Overhead allocation is the accounting method of spreading indirect costs like rent, insurance, and office salaries across jobs or departments so true profitability can be measured.

Parts Markup

Parts markup is the percentage added to the wholesale cost of a part to set the retail price the customer pays.

Revenue per Tech

Revenue per tech is total company revenue divided by the number of field technicians on staff, a benchmark for operational efficiency.

Technician Revenue

Technician revenue is the total dollar amount of work that an individual field technician has billed over a given time period.

Transaction Fee

A transaction fee is the per-transaction charge a payment processor adds on top of the percentage rate when a customer pays with a credit or debit card.

Average Ticket

Average ticket is the mean revenue generated per service call, calculated by dividing total invoiced revenue by the number of completed jobs.

Call Answer Rate

Call answer rate is the percentage of incoming phone calls that are picked up by a live person or automated system before going to voicemail.

Close Rate

Close rate is the percentage of presented estimates that result in a booked job or signed contract.

Cross-Sell

Cross-sell is the practice of offering a customer a service from a different trade or department than the one they originally called for.

Customer Lifetime Value

Customer lifetime value, or CLV, is the total amount of revenue a customer is expected to generate for a business over the entire duration of the relationship.

Customer Retention

Customer retention is the percentage of customers who continue doing business with a company over a defined time period, usually measured annually.

Customer Service Representative (CSR)

A customer service representative, or CSR, is the office team member who answers incoming calls, books service appointments, and handles customer questions.

Lead Response Time

Lead response time is the number of minutes between a new customer inquiry arriving and the business making first contact to respond.

Pipeline

Pipeline is the total value and count of open opportunities a contractor is actively pursuing but has not yet won or lost.

Review Velocity

Review velocity is the rate at which a business earns new online reviews, typically measured as reviews per week or per month.

Upsell Rate

Upsell rate is the percentage of service calls on which a technician successfully sells additional work beyond the original reason for the visit.

Virtual Receptionist

A virtual receptionist is a live or smart automation service that answers customer calls on behalf of a field service business, books appointments, and dispatches emergencies.

Win Rate

Win rate is the percentage of competitive bids a contractor successfully wins against other bidders on commercial or public projects.

Cost per Acquisition (CPA)

Cost per acquisition, or CPA, is the total marketing spend divided by the number of customers actually won, measuring what it costs to acquire one paying customer.

Customer Churn

Customer churn is the percentage of customers who stop doing business with a company over a given period, usually measured annually.

Google Business Profile

A Google Business Profile is the free listing a business creates on Google that shows up in map results, local searches, and Google Maps.

Local Service Ads (LSA)

Local Service Ads are Google's pay-per-lead advertising format for local service businesses, where the ad shows at the top of search results and charges only when a qualified customer contacts the business.

Marketing Cost per Lead

Marketing cost per lead is the total marketing spend divided by the number of qualified inquiries it generated over the same period.

NPS (Net Promoter Score)

Net Promoter Score, or NPS, is a 0-to-100 metric that measures how likely customers are to recommend a business to friends and family.

Reputation Management

Reputation management is the ongoing practice of monitoring, earning, and responding to online reviews to maintain a positive public image for the business.

Digital Signature

A digital signature is a legally binding electronic mark a customer applies to a document on a screen, replacing a physical ink signature.

Field Service Management

Field service management, or FSM, is the software category that coordinates dispatching, scheduling, invoicing, and mobile work orders for technicians in the field.

Proof of Completion

Proof of completion is the documented evidence, usually photos, notes, and signatures, that confirms a service job was finished and delivered to the customer's satisfaction.

Stock Keeping Unit (SKU)

A stock keeping unit, or SKU, is a unique identifier assigned to every distinct part, product, or service in an inventory system.

Apprentice

An apprentice is an entry-level trades worker learning their trade under the supervision of a journeyman or master through a formal training program.

BTU

A BTU, or British Thermal Unit, is the amount of heat required to raise one pound of water by one degree Fahrenheit, used to measure heating and cooling capacity.

Inspection

An inspection is an official or in-house review of completed work to confirm it meets code, safety, and quality standards before the job is closed out.

Journeyman

A journeyman is a skilled tradesperson who has completed an apprenticeship and is licensed to perform trade work independently under a master's supervision.

Load Calculation

A load calculation is the engineering process of determining the precise heating, cooling, or electrical capacity a building needs based on its size, materials, and usage.

Permit Pulling

Permit pulling is the process of obtaining required government approvals before beginning work that is regulated by local building, plumbing, electrical, or mechanical codes.

Refrigerant Recovery

Refrigerant recovery is the federally regulated process of removing and containing refrigerant from HVAC or refrigeration equipment before service or disposal.

SEER Rating

SEER, or Seasonal Energy Efficiency Ratio, is a standard measurement of how efficiently a central air conditioner or heat pump operates over a typical cooling season.

Soft Skills Training

Soft skills training teaches field technicians communication, empathy, and sales habits that drive customer satisfaction and revenue alongside technical ability.

Technical Certification

A technical certification is a formal credential that verifies a technician has mastered specific skills, equipment, or regulatory requirements in their trade.