Kickserv is a field service management solution, headquartered in Austin, Texas. It includes features such as dynamic scheduling optimization, invoicing and online payments, and detailed reporting.
$79
per month
Acuity Scheduling, a Squarespace company
Score 8.3 out of 10
N/A
Acuity Scheduling is an appointment management platform developed by the company of the same name in New York and acquired by Squarespace in 2019.
We use KickServ for nearly every aspect of our operation and cannot think of a scenario when it is "inappropriate" or "less appropriate". It is the backbone of our operation and is used for everything from data gathering to estimates to invoices to payments and accounts receivables to reports to tracking to storage of photos and past invoices. Better searching abilities would be good instead of having to create tags for things we don't know we are going to need later.
I think any business can benefit from Acuity Scheduling. In my experience, however, and maybe I just haven’t found the correct settings yet, it’s been difficult to manage 4 business schedules with multiple employees and varying hours that change day-to-day and week-to-week. So I definitely would recommend it to more simple business models with set hours, as it seems like it would have all the functions one might need. I still would recommend to more complex businesses like mine as well, but also include discussion of some of the potential drawbacks.
Organization - keeps everything organized nicely and has several different filters that you can use to view only the information you need.
Simple website - this was important because you want it to load quickly when you are in the office and on the road.
Database - keeps track of the things that you enter. This is nice when trying to get information on a product or a price when requested by the customer.
Clicking on the link opens up my calendar, which has an uncluttered look, making it easy for my prospects and clients to review their options and make their choice.
I am able to customize my schedule, the types of appointments I want to offer, and even decide how many appointments I want in a day. There are so many details that I can customize.
I can customize how my calendar and emails look for my prospects and clients so that I come across professional and coordinated. I want the look of my business, website, etc. to have a polished, cohesive, and interesting presence.
I love that there is a workshop/class/series option for my workshops. My attendees reserve their place and pay upfront. I can duplicate these events or add future dates. It's wonderful. This saves us a lot of time and is so convenient.
I haven't had any trouble with my scheduler. It works flawlessly, so I don't have to take time out of my day to fix, troubleshoot or call customer service.
I love that I can add questions for my prospects to answer right away before booking a call. This means 3 fewer steps for me. 1. They answer these questions without an email from me. 2. They make their reservation and get a follow-up email, right away. 3. I customized the follow-up email with more details and actions to take to prepare for our call.
Acuity Scheduling has been very reliable. If you don't believe me, check out their status page here. They do a pretty decent job maintaining their app. To be fair, it's a pretty simple tool so they shouldn't run into too many hiccups given it doesn't feature near as many options as other applications on the market run.
It is intuitive enough, but there is some training that will be necessary because of a perceived redundancy within their workflow. It can be hard to distinguish which stage a customer is in (thus what the most important thing to be working on, if you are in sales, for instance) without some training.
It is very easy to use once you get to know the program but with years of working with the program I am still finding new things that I had wished I knew about earlier. I feel like aspects of the website become hidden that would help productivity a lot if I knew they existed beforehand.
Very good technical help. The team is well-versed in their product and what to look for, particularly when interacting with other software platforms. You nearly always get a live person when you call, and if you don't, they will return your call promptly. This is another factor in my client's decision to move forward with their solution.
Every time I had a question on how to do something or had any issues with Acuity Scheduling, mainly in the very beginning, when I was learning the platform, customer service was excellent. They were prompt to respond, friendly, and very helpful until I had the right solution.
In the case of Schedulicity, the system was awesome (very easy to set up and had some nice features) but did not offer the functionality and flexibility that AcuityScheduling does. In the case of SimplyBook.me, they offer lots of functionality but the interface is extremely complex and you pay a la carte for features so you're going to pay exponentially more for the same set of features as compared to AcuityScheduling. Their customer service was also lacking, in my opinion.
We are essentially paper free. No paper work orders.
We've been able to avoid a layer of middle management by supplementing this layer with technology. KickServ is a part of that layer.
Negatively speaking, like all technology, it has created a void of human level connection. Because we know that we can deliver work orders to our foremen remotely, we are less likely to drive up to the shop and shake a hand or see someone face to face. We had to learn that lesson the hard way, that both technology and human connection are necessary to maintain our culture.
