In this lesson, we will examine the concept of an Installed Base and how it can be used to effectively manage and track products installed at customer locations. An Installed Base is a hierarchical representation of products at various customer sites, helping service agents streamline asset management and customer support. We will also discuss how to access and maintain these Installed Bases within SAP Service Cloud Version 2.
An installed base is a hierarchical structure of your products located or installed at a customer's site. If your customer has your products at multiple sites, you could have an installed base for each location. Alternatively, you could maintain a single installed base for the customer, with the products' different locations indicated as functional locations (also known as installation points) within it.
For example, imagine a customer of yours runs a rental car agency in two cities, with two rental locations in each city. This could be shown in your system as an installed base of four active locations or sites. If each site has 25 cars, then there are 25 products and/or registered products.
Another example could be a hotel company’s exercise bikes, as shown above. This is an installed base hierarchy consisting of two functional locations (cities), each with a hotel, but the larger hotel is further subdivided into two more functional locations because it has two gyms, not just one (different locations within the same building).
An installed base helps you more effectively track and manage your products at customer locations, enabling you to greatly improve your customer service process.
A customer’s installed assets can:
- Be tracked
- Each could have an employee responsible and possibly a primary technician assigned.
- Have their service histories tracked
How to Access Installed Bases?
Service Agents can access the Installed Bases worklist through the navigation menu by searching for Installed Bases. From the worklist screen, service agents can create new Installed Bases or open existing ones. There are no configuration settings required to use Installed Bases. However, service agents must have the proper authorization access.
Hierarchical Arrangement of Items
When managing a hierarchical setup of items for an Installed Base, only the following new objects can be linked:
- A new Registered Product
- A new Product
- A new Functional Location
Additional Information Available on the Installed Base
Along with the item's hierarchy, the following details can also be maintained on the Installed Base:
- The Involved Parties, for example, who is the customer.
- The Related Service Objects, such as existing cases involving any items of the installed base.
- Attachments, for example, drawings or technical diagrams representing the items
- Change logs.
Maintaining an Installed Base in SAP Service Cloud Version 2 – Video
In this video, Sabine, the service agent, will create two Registered Products and assign them to an Installed Base.
Video Summary
- Create and register the first product by entering product details, serial ID, contact name, selecting the customer equipment category, and choosing a 12-month warranty.
- Save the first registered product and update its status to Active on the Quick View screen.
- Set the installed base status to Active.
- Create and register the second product using similar steps: enter product details, serial ID, contact name, select category and warranty, then save.
Change the status of the second registered product to Active and verify that both products are successfully registered in the installed base.