Tracking Santa Made Easier with Dynamics 365 for Field Service

by Scott LeFante 5 minute read

For many, Christmas is the most wonderful time of the year. It’s also the busiest time of the year for Santa, the Elves and the Reindeer so the North Pole has utilized many facets of Microsoft Dynamics 365 to make their lives easier, including Project Service Automation and Field Service functionality.

In past years, Santa had to rely on Rudolph and his shiny nose to navigate through rough weather. While Rudolph’s nose can cut through even the nastiest of storms, Santa and his reindeer still managed to occasionally find themselves off course. This year, Santa and the team plan to utilize another amazing Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Field Service Mobile to help offset any issues while in-route to delivering presents to those who made the “Nice List” all around the World.

Background Location Sharing

The Microsoft Field Service team has been busy this year. In addition to all the amazing updates to Field Service, Resource Schedule Optimization and more, they worked directly with Santa and Resco to deliver functionality within the mobile platform to help track Santa’s real-time GPS position. Last year, the Elves lost communication with Santa somewhere over South America. This was due to a short in Santa’s two-way communicator embedded in his hat. This year, they vow to not let that happen again.

The latest version of Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Field Service Mobile now allows for Santa to share his current location with the North Pole tracking team (aka Elves) allowing Santa’s GPS position to be sent back to Dynamics 365 for Field Service so the Elves can see where Santa is with Mobile Auditing or even on the Schedule Board.

Unlike Santa and the reindeer, the GPS tracking of Santa does not magically occur. Santa assigned a special mobile task force of Elves to configure and test the functionality prior to the big night.

The mobile task force (E.L.V.E.S.) were kind enough to share with us exactly what they had to do to make the real-time tracking of Santa a success. They are highly confident they will not “lose” Santa this time around.

Key Features of Background Location Sharing

The E.L.V.E.S. team knew just how critical it was to understand this new functionality within Dynamics 365 for Field Service Mobile. Santa tasked this team to not only implement this functionality, but to also understand the key features. The team, came up with this list courtesy of the assistance of Microsoft and Resco:

  • Implemented as a background service that’s activated in Woodford
  • It can run even with the Field Service Mobile app is “killed”
  • It runs even when the Field Service Mobile app runs in the background
  • Santa can disable it in the app setup; but the E.L.V.E.S. team forbade this and locked this setting from being changed. (Mrs. Claus later thanked the team and told Santa he better not pout over it either).
  • Location Tracking records are sent directly to the Microsoft Dynamics 365 service.
  • Tracking data is stored in Dynamics 365 for Customer Engagement. You can find them in the Mobile Auditing entity.

Mobile Project Configuration

The E.L.V.E.S. team were able to work with Microsoft and obtain the latest version of Dynamics 365 for Field Service and Field Service Mobile.

Once they had the latest and greatest versions, they quickly went to work enabling location tracking; and once inside the Woodford Solution, they opened their current project, Santa, and were able to quickly configure and enable location tracking.

Reviewing the Data/Tracking Santa on the BIG NIGHT

Mrs. Claus, Santa, and the Elves all wanted to know: does it work and will it be accurate on the big night? The answer to both of those questions was an astounding “YES” and on the big night, the E.L.V.E.S. team and Mrs. Claus will be able to track Santa.

Santa is meticulous when planning out his night. He plans the exact route and stops months in advanced (granted, as kids make it onto the naughty or nice list, he must alter it a tad, but most make it onto the nice list. After all, it’s Christmas).

On the iSanta 2018 phone, Santa uses Dynamics 365 for Field Service Mobile quite a bit. You see, all the houses of the good children all around the world are entered onto the schedule board. Santa’s Bookings within Field Service Mobile are quite filled up. As such, Santa can also go into the Mobile Audit area within Dynamics 365 for Field Service Mobile and track his own whereabouts throughout the evening. Santa can compare this to all the houses he needs to deliver presents and determine if he’s ahead of schedule, on time or behind. Hopefully if behind, he can catch up by deploying some of his Elves that are equipped with jet packs.

Summary

Thanks to Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Field Service, the Elves and Mrs. Claus can easily track Santa and ensure he’s right on schedule. All can take comfort that even in the worst of weather, the team back in the North Pole can assist Santa with whatever he may need on his busiest and most stressful night of the year.

Companies all around the world can also take advantage of Dynamics 365 for Field Service’s unparalleled insight and efficiencies in the areas above along with and so much more.

To learn more about how Dynamics 365 for Field Service capabilities can help your organization, contact us today!