Aspire Mobile in the Field

Overview

Aspire Mobile is designed to help your company’s crews be successful on the job site each day.

As a crew leader, learn how to quickly review your schedule, allocate materials, add photos, prioritize jobs, understand your route(s), and perform other tasks right from your mobile device.

Understanding Aspire Mobile’s features helps keep your day organized, and focused equipped to tackle any project! This article shows you how to use Aspire Mobile.

PDF resource

For a simplified, printable version of this article that you can hand out to your crew, click the download button next to the printer icon in the preview below.

Articles to Read Before Using Aspire Mobile

✅Before using Aspire Mobile, the application must be downloaded and installed on each crew leader’s device. To learn more about device set up, please read here.

✅ Read Creating an Employee Contact in Aspire and set up your Crew Leaders and Crew Members so they can use Aspire Mobile.

Difference Between Crew Leader and Crew Member Experience

Here’s an example of the difference between a Crew Leader (left) who manages a route, compared to a Crew Member (right) who can only clock in and out for the day:

Here’s a chart to breakdown what Crew Leaders can do when they log in vs. what Crew Members can see when they log in.

Crew Members can download Aspire Mobile on their own device, or they can clock in and out for the day on the Crew Leader’s device.

Crew Members only have the ability to clock in and out. Any employee that uses Aspire Mobile can log in using either their PIN or their email and password.

Changing Language Settings

Aspire Mobile offers a Spanish language option on the login page or in the app settings.

This changes the language in which prompts and labels are displayed, but it doesn’t affect text entered by team members, such as notes.

Learn more in our article about changing language and using dynamic translation.

Starting the Day with Aspire Mobile

Starting the day fully prepared is easier when using Aspire Mobile. Crew Leaders can take a few minutes each morning to clock in and review the Daily Plan. They can also check their tickets and review specific notes that need their attention before they head out to their first job.

Clocking in for the day as a Crew Leader

If you’ve just gotten to the yard and are preparing for the day, you still need to track time for yourself and your crew members, even if you aren’t onsite yet for the first job of the day. This will get tracked as indirect time in Time Entry.

When you first log in for the day, you’ll only be able to clock yourself in until each crew member logs in on your device. You’ll log in first, clock in, then log out. Then, have each crew member log in on your device using their employee PIN. After that, you can start and stop work on jobs for yourself and each crew member and clock crew members in, out and back in for lunch, and then out at the end of the day.

Learn more in our articles about clocking in and out in Aspire Mobile.

Note:

If a crew member logs themselves in while logged into their account, they’re immediately logged out of the device.

Before the Job Site

Daily Plan

In Aspire Mobile, the Daily Plan page is the default screen for crew leaders when they first log in. Crew leaders can toggle between Today and Tomorrow views and review the tickets for the day, scan the materials list to see what has been delivered to their job sites for the day, and review the properties your crews are servicing.

To learn more about the administrator side of the Daily Plan, check out this article.

The Daily Plan screen has clickable sections that lets crew leaders review:

• Tickets

• Materials

• Indirect Services (Total time not on a job)

• Scheduled Equipment

Tickets Tab

The Tickets tab displays a list of tickets for the route the crew leader is on. This gives the Crew Leader a quick overview of what tickets their crew will be servicing that day. Issues relating to the properties on that day’s schedule will appear first to review. Clicking on one of the tickets here will redirect crew leaders to the job details screen to begin work if need be. This is especially helpful when doing address lookup of a property, and even using your device GPS to navigate to each site.

By clicking on your first ticket of the day, an arrow icon displays the address of the property based on Google Maps. This is helpful when needing GPS directions to a property for the first time, or if you have new employees that haven’t been onsite before.

Materials Tab

The Materials tab allows crew leaders to view materials estimated to the job. The materials list first appears on the Daily Plan screen and is read only. The reason this Materials tab is read only is because it’s simply for helping your crews load their equipment or materials for the day.

If you need to allocate materials, you would need to drill into the work ticket details under Tickets. We show this later!

Indirect Services tab

The Indirect Services tab displays a list of the indirect services from the day’s work tickets. This section is helpful to track your crew’s non-job related activities, like Shop Time or Drive Time.

Scheduled Equipment tab

View equipment scheduled for your work tickets. This tab mirrors the Daily Plan report in Aspire Cloud, giving Crew Leaders quick access to the tools assigned to their route and helping them prepare efficiently for the day ahead.

On the Job Site

When the crew is ready to head to their first job site, the crew leader selects the Tickets button at the bottom of the screen. The Ticket Schedule screen shows crew leaders work to be performed on their route as well as indirect services like Shop Time and Travel Time. Leaders can select any ticket and start work on it.

Clocking into a job

On the Ticket Schedule screen, select a ticket, then select Start work to start time on a job for you and your crew. In the example below, crew leader Tony is also working the job, so they’ll click Start All when the team gets to work. Now the crew is logging direct Time on the job!

This screen also helps with:

• Labor tracking - Total work hours are tracked for payroll and job costing when you use this screen.

• Location tagging - When starting and stopping time at the job site, if location services are allowed on your crews’ devices, GPS tagging records the location of the employee.

Note:

Indirect Services appear on the Ticket Schedule in blue text. You are able to confirm they are in progress by noting they are illuminated in green and are at the top of the ticket schedule screen!

Crew leaders can use the tabs at the top of the Ticket Schedule screen to see work tickets scheduled on their routes for Yesterday/Today, Today, Tomorrow, This Week, or Next Week.

Aside from logging time on a ticket, crew leaders can also do the following after selecting a specific ticket:

• View, update, or create issues associated with a work ticket.

• View or add inventory materials used on a work ticket.

• View documents, notes, and photos tied to an opportunity, property, or work ticket.

After selecting a work ticket for a job that crews are onsite for, it’s important to start work on this screen so you can bill your customers and get recorded hours worked for payroll purposes.

Adding Items

While on the job site, you might be allocating materials or equipment to the services that were estimated and you are now performing! You can do this right from Aspire Mobile!

Allocating Material Items

Crew leaders can record quantities of items used on jobs within the Work Ticket by clicking the Materials button. In the example below, Crew Leader Camille is allocating the material for Fertilizer onto the Install Spring Color ticket.

📌Note: The material allocated here on the ticket will show as our actual material quantity in Aspire.

For more information on how to mark an item as inventory, visit Adding a Material Item to the Item Catalog.

Adding Equipment Items

If your company estimates equipment items for a service, the crew leader can choose to tie equipment to a crew member when starting time on a work ticket. (This is helpful for T&M opportunities where the estimated versus actual times are related to the invoiced amounts.)

When a crew leader ties an equipment item to a crew member, this tells Aspire Mobile who will be operating the equipment item before crews start their time. The drop down provides a list of equipment items included from the opportunity’s estimate.

📌Note: Equipment Items are not related to the Equipment module. For more information on the equipment module, read this article.

If Crew Leader Camille is driving the 4x4 utility cart, and the crew members are using other equipment, you’d want to track this information before starting time on a client’s job. This makes sure the time spent on site matches what has been estimated for the job.

If a crew member uses billable equipment but then stops using it before their work is completed, the crew leader can handle this in Aspire Mobile. Crew Leaders can stop time for the crew member, which also stops time for the equipment in use. Then, the crew leader can restart time for the crew member without re-selecting equipment.

This allows the crew member to continue working on that same ticket without the equipment charges.

Crew leaders or crew members can switch or correct equipment without stopping work on a ticket. This helps crews accurately record which equipment items they used. If a crew member or leader realizes they chose the wrong equipment, they can select the equipment and choose Correct Equipment to preserve the time logged on the ticket. If they want to keep the time logged for one piece of equipment and start time on a new one, they can choose Start Time on New Equipment.

Taking a Break for Lunch

It’s important to record lunch breaks in Aspire Mobile. Crew Leader Tony and their team are hungry and need to take a break from the productive day they are having! Tony logs back into Aspire Mobile and navigates to the Time button at the bottom of the screen to report lunch.

As the Crew Leader, Tony can report lunch for everyone on her route, or crew members can report lunch on their own by logging into their Aspire Mobile account and selecting Report Lunch.

🧠You don’t have to stop time on a work ticket to take lunch! If time is currently active on a work ticket, selecting the Report Lunch button tells Aspire that the active work ticket is the one that will have lunch subtracted.

Reviewing, Updating, and Creating Issues

Sometimes problems come up on a job site that need to be taken care of. This is where issues come in.

Let’s say that before the crew arrives on site, the property owner reports an issue they want help with that isn’t part of the scheduled work. The crew leader records the request as an issue.

When viewing the work ticket, the crew leader selects Open Issues, taps the plus icon, and then fills in the issue type, writes a comment detailing the issue, and optionally uploads an image showing evidence of the issue.

Note:

When Issues are created in Aspire Mobile, the Property Account Owner, Property Operations Manager, and Branch Manager will receive an Issue email.

After adding an issue, it appears in the Open Issues list. Clicking on an issue shows its details. Crew leaders can:

1. Mark the issue complete if it was resolved

2. Add a comment including additional images

3. View issue text and images in full screen

Leaving the Job Site

Stopping Time On a Job

If time on the selected work ticket was started for any crew members, then the buttons for those buttons will be labeled Stop. Crew Leaders can stop or start work on the ticket for all or some of the crew on their route. When Crew Leader Camille’s team is done, she can click Stop All to stop recording time and she and her team can move onto the next job.

The completed work ticket shifts to the bottom of the Ticket Schedule screen and Camille and her crew can travel to the next job site.

📌Note: This does not mean that the entire team is clocked out for the day. This just means that the time on the job is done and the team can travel to their next job. The time in between the two job sites will be considered Indirect Job time, also called Drive Time.🛻

Ending The Day

Before the end of the day, you can confirm all job details and notes are up-to-date, and stop time for the day. You can review the day's completed jobs and follow up on outstanding customer issues needing attention.

To be prepared, you can look ahead at tomorrow's schedule and prep any materials needed. With Aspire Mobile, you can finish each day organized, with clear plans for starting tomorrow off right. Ending the shift with Aspire puts your crew in the best position to tackle the next day!

Clocking out of the Day with Crew Leader

Crew Leaders can instruct their crew members to clock themselves out, or they can clock everyone out for the day. At the end of each day, crew leaders can use Aspire Mobile to clock their entire team out at once. With just a few taps, Crew Leader Camille can record end times for all her crew members on her route. This allows a quick shift wrap up!

Don’t forget, Aspire Mobile can be set up to where crew members can clock themselves out for the day when their shift ends.

Additional Features

In Aspire Mobile, there are additional features available that you might want to consider offering for your Crew Leaders to use.

Force Sync

The Force Sync feature in Aspire Mobile lets you manually sync your data with the cloud at any time. This is useful if you know you’re about to enter a low-connectivity area and want to make sure you have access to all of the latest information for your routes.

Select the three-line icon in the top left corner of the screen to open the action menu, then select Force Sync.

When data is syncing, you can check the status of the data by selecting the cloud icon next to the bell icon at the top right corner of the screen. The cloud icon is only available when data is syncing or queued to sync.

Manage Navigation

You can enable navigation preferences for crews so they can personalize what features display in their navigation panel. When this user role is enabled, crew leaders have the Manage Navigation option in their menu. When they select it, they can drag and drop up to 5 features into their navigation panel. Any features that are not added to the panel will display in the menu. You can enable this feature in the mobile section of the Administration > Configuration > Application screen.

Note:

The feature at the top of the list is the default feature for the app and will appear first when a user logs in.

Using Weathermatic

Weathermatic is an optional third party integration that provides watering solutions with irrigation systems. Weathermatic can be opened on the work ticket details screen.

These systems offer remote management when crews are offsite.

When the Weathermatic link is clicked for the first time for a property, Aspire navigates to Weathermatic and uses the geolocation of the selected property. The Weathermatic website is displayed showing a list of all properties within one mile of the specified location.

When the user selects one of the sites from the list, that site will be tied to the Aspire property so that in the future, selecting the Weathermatic link for that property will go directly to the management screen for the property.

The Weathermatic Property Management screen will then be displayed.

Using Snow Mode

To turn on Snow Mode, select Snow Mode after logging into Aspire Mobile under Settings.

When you are in Snow Mode, work tickets with services and items that have Category Names with Snow in them are displayed.