we are looking for a program with a couple must haves and a few would be nice elements

Must have's
1. office can enter work orders that sit in an unassigned "to be done pool" with no tech or date assigned.
2. Can attach photos, or other documentation to the work order
3. office can assign a tech and date / time to work order and emails are sent to client and tech
4. techs can just "take" a work order from the pool
5. upon completion of the work order or while it is still open photos can be attached to it
6. All of this must be accessible from a tablet either ipad or android and be extremely easy to use
7. notifications upon work orders sitting for to long with no progress either after they have been assigned or prior to being assigned

Nice options
1. place for customers to login and see status and notes
2. place for customers to schedule there own work orders
3. a way for client to sign off on the tablet


anyone know of anything out there? In addition to work orders, this will also be used to manage our short term installs, 2-3 days.

For example.
I am on a job site and meeting with a client he shows me a cable that needs to be relocated. I snap a few pictures, and create the work order on the spot and assign it to a tech. when he looks at it he can see the description and the photos of what needs to be done. upon completion he takes finished photos adds a description, and the completed work order with photos and other documents is sent by email to the client

http://www.wrike.com/

Although they may not use the terminology of 'Work Order', I believe you can effectively do everything you described.

I'm not sure of a particular one that does all that, and based on response here looks like you'll have to do your own research. However, I did google "work ticket software" and that seemed to be a better start than "work order". Try service ticket as well maybe?

We are starting to dick around with Field Service Management (Intuit) which, I believe, will handle much of what you're after. I would have to dig deeper to confirm, though and that ain't gonna happen this weekend.

I've seen a lot of these posts over the years and it sure would help when people make them if in addition to features they'd give some criteria for the budget that has been set, and whether they are looking for on-site or hosted software.

Otherwise it's sort of like saying "I want a home theater", it could mean almost anything. For instance, if you are looking for hosted are you willing to spend $10 per user per month or $200 per user per month? If in house software are you willing to spend $500 or $25,000? 3 users or 25 users?

Anyhow, if you want to find many options the terms to Google are "field service software", "service management software" or some combination thereof.

I would not encourage my clients to schedule their own appts. UNLESS the software was intuitive enough to group appts. choices with location.

Example: Thursday 9:00 am should NOT be available for selection if the Thursday 11:00-1:00 is a 45 minute drive to the other side of town.

That sort of flexibility for the client would fail on the first day of implementation.