6 steps to get started with managing services

The 6 items in this article cover the basics for getting started managing services for the service scheduling features in Microsoft Dynamics CRM. The Resource Center also includes many articles for taking full advantage of the Service Scheduling features. For a complete list, visit the Resource Center by clicking Resource Center in the Navigation Pane. For more information, see the Help.

It is possible that the terminology used in Microsoft Dynamics CRM has been customized.

Key steps

1. Learn the service terminology
   • Service: A type of work performed for a customer by one or more resources. Services are schedulable activities.
   • Resource: Users, facilities or equipment, or teams that can be scheduled and have work schedules.
   • Resource groups: Groups of resources that can be scheduled interchangeably.
   • Work Hours: The hours that a resource is available for scheduling.
   • Site: The location of a resource. Use sites to make sure that the customer and the resource are in the same location.
   • Service activity: A schedulable appointment to provide a service to a customer. A service activity uses one or more resources to perform a service at a specific time and place. An appointment is a schedulable activity that does not use services and does not require a resource with work hours.
   • Scheduling Rule: A set of criteria that specifies which personnel, equipment, facilities, or resource groups are required to perform a service, or how to select these resources, based on parameters like quantity and capacity.
2. Define a selection rule

   To add a resource to a service, you must define a selection rule to determine how resources are selected for service activities.

   You can create a simple rule that selects resources from a list, or a compound rule that selects a combination of resources, or a complex tree of selection rules that selects from groups of equivalent resources.

   For examples of selection rules, see the Help topic Types of Selection Rules.

3. Understand capacity versus effort

   You can set up services and resources in Microsoft Dynamics CRM to take into account different-sized facilities or the experience levels of your users when a service is scheduled. This is known as capacity scheduling. Capacity is a relative unit that you define. For example, you could define capacity in a bicycle repair shop as the number of bikes the shop has room to accommodate at the same time. If a repair bay has room for four bike-repair stations, the repair bay can accept four bikes for repair or inspection at the same time.

   Capacity can also measure skill level. For example, a junior bike technician has the ability to perform one bike inspection per hour, and a senior technician has the ability to perform four bike inspections per hour. If two bikes must be inspected in one hour, it takes either two junior technicians, or one senior technician who can perform the inspections in half the time.

   When you add effort required into the selection rule, every time a user searches for an available service activity time, the selection rules inspect the resources for capacity available. If the resource is scheduled, then that resource's capacity is reduced by the effort required for the service. This is repeated every time that a service is scheduled requiring that resource, until the capacity is exhausted.

   Capacity is defined in the resources working hours. Effort required is defined in the service. You can think of capacity as "how much money you have" and effort required as "how much something costs."

   For example, the repair bay has a capacity of 4. A bike repair requires an effort of 1 and a tandem bike repair requires an effort of 2. The first time the repair bay is selected, its capacity is reduced to 3 for that time. The next service activity scheduled is for a tandem bike. This reduces the repair bay's capacity by 2. The repair bay has the capacity of 1 left, which means it could accept another bike repair, but not a tandem bike repair.

4. Add resources to existing services

   Open the service, under Required Resources, click Add Resources:

   1. In the Look Up Records dialog box, select the records that you want to add. You can add as many records as you want, and they can be a mix of individual users, facilities, equipment, and teams.
   2. To add resource groups to the selection rule, click Add Resource Groups.
   3. In the Look Up Records dialog box, select the records that you want to add. You can add as many records as you want.
5. Use resource groups

   Use resource groups to group users, facilities, and equipment as part of the selection rules for a service. You can add resources to a resource group from the service record.

6. Test your service

   To test your service, create a service activity with no criteria other than the service. You can use the results to confirm that the service is selecting correctly. The yellow warning bar will also display any problems with the search.

   1. In the Navigation Pane, click Service, and then click Service Calendar.
   2. In the New group, click Service Activity. This bypasses the scheduling form.
   3. Select the service to test.
   4. Click Find Available Times.

Related Links

Services articles