Ensure 24-hour availability for all service resources, including capacity-based and individual resources or crews, to support seamless scheduling across standard and extended working hours. This setup, available only when you're using Enhanced Scheduling and Optimization, is essential for roles requiring round-the-clock coverage, such as emergency services or IT support.
Required Editions
| Available in: both Salesforce Classic (not available in all orgs) and Lightning Experience |
| The Field Service core features, managed package, and mobile app are available in Enterprise, Unlimited, and Developer Editions. |
| To access the Field Service mobile app, users need the Field Service Mobile user license. |
You can choose one of these methods to enable continuous availability for your service resources.
- Set operating hours: Define operating hours to include both standard and extended timeframes to allow for continuous service coverage.
- Use Shifts: Tailor shifts to accommodate extended or continuous working hours,to ensure flexibility for specific scenarios such as emergency repairs or high-priority tasks.
Considerations
For individuals and crews,
- Travel time: For workers with 24-hour availability, travel time is calculated based on assignments within the continuous window. If there are appointments before and after an assignment, travel time is calculated between those appointments. If there are no appointments scheduled within the 24-hour window before or after, and the start of the shift is unknown, the system defaults to calculating travel time to and from the worker's home base. For example, David is a worker with 24-hour availability. If David has only one assignment on Thursday and no appointments within 24 hours before or after, the system calculates travel time from his home base to the assignment and back. However, if David has assignments on both Wednesday and Friday, the system calculates Thursday's travel time between the Wednesday and Friday appointments.
- Sliding in appointment booking and schedule operations: When 24-hour availability is enabled, appointments can slide across shifts since the system treats it as one continuous shift. Without 24-hour availability, appointments are restricted to sliding only within the defined shift.
Limitations
For individuals and crews:
- Lunch breaks:
- Fixed Scheduling: Dynamic lunch breaks aren’t supported. You must schedule a fixed lunch break at a specific time instead.
- 7-Day Optimization: If a 7-day period is optimized for a 24/7 shift, lunch breaks are created for all 7 days, even if only one service appointment is scheduled on the first day. If the appointment is later unscheduled by a dispatcher, the lunch breaks for the remaining days remain on the Gantt.
- Minimized overtime objective: When 24-hour availability is set up with intervals of regular and extended working hours, the minimized overtime objective isn’t supported. For example, during extended working hours, a repair task is scheduled earlier in the extended shift rather than postponed to a later time during regular working hours.
For capacity-based resources:
- Appointment scheduling: Appointments spanning multiple days, such as those crossing midnight, are split across the respective days. Capacity tracking is calculated based on the set daily hours to ensure accurate scheduling.