# Analyzing an After-Sales Service Process Using Object-Centric ProcessMining: A Case Study

- Type: Conference paper
- URL: https://www.gyunam.com/publication/2023-icpm-pqmi-2/
- Date: 2023-01-01
- Authors: Gyunam Park, Sevde Aydin, Cüneyt Ugur, Wil M. P. van der Aalst
- Venue: Process Mining Workshops - ICPM 2023 International Workshops, Rome,Italy, October 23-27, 2023, Revised Selected Papers
- DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-56107-8_31
- PDF: https://www.gyunam.com/publication/2023-icpm-pqmi-2/paper.pdf
- Research lines: [Object-centric process mining](https://www.gyunam.com/research-line/object-centric-process-mining/index.md)

## Abstract

Process mining, a technique turning event data into business process insights, has traditionally operated on the assumption that each event corresponds to a singular case or object. However, many real-world processes are intertwined with multiple objects, making them object-centric. This paper focuses on the emerging domain of object-centric process mining, highlighting its potential yet underexplored benefits in actual operational scenarios. Through an in-depth case study of Borusan Cat’s after-sales service process, this study emphasizes the capability of object-centric process mining to capture entangled business process details. Utilizing an event log of approximately 65,000 events, our analysis underscores the importance of embracing this paradigm for richer business insights and enhanced operational improvements.

## Practical problem

Service companies dispatch field technicians to customer sites through scheduling systems in which one technician handles many schedules a day and a schedule may involve several technicians. Traditional process mining looks at one schedule at a time, so it cannot show how a technician's day unfolds across several jobs, why planned hours are overrun, or how a delay at one site cascades into the next. Object-centric process mining is designed for such intertwined objects, but tools for it have rarely been applied in practice, and managers lack documented real-life evidence of what it reveals and how to run such a project.

## Research questions

1. How can an organization plan and execute an object-centric process mining project on a service process with many-to-many relations between schedules and technicians?
2. What does the interaction between schedules and technicians look like in practice, and where does it deviate from the company's business rules?
3. Where do bottlenecks arise at the intersection of schedules and technicians, and what improvements follow?

## Contributions

- An extension of the PM2 process mining project methodology into five stages for object-centric projects: planning, extraction, data preprocessing, mining and analysis, improvement.
- An object-centric event log in the OCEL standard extracted from the Oracle database of Borusan Cat's WeKing scheduling application (65,774 events, 6,483 schedules, 173 technicians).
- A case study combining object-centric Petri net discovery, compliance rule monitoring and object-centric performance metrics on the after-sales service process.
- A technician-day case notion that makes single-viewpoint analysis of technician workload tractable.
- Documented improvement actions implemented at the company and proposals for further ones.

## Key findings

- After preprocessing (57,601 events, 5,566 schedules, 169 technicians), 4,282 of 5,566 schedules are overwork, meaning actual hours exceed scheduled hours; about 25% of technician-days exceed 12 hours, and days with a HOLD activity are 3% longer.
- The discovered object-centric Petri net reveals deviations from the reference model; in 2023 the rule 'one survey per schedule' is violated 2,222 times, 'no hold before arriving on site' 144 times and 'survey only after job completion' 124 times.
- Travel from ENROUTE to ONSITE takes 2.02 hours on average (maximum 12.67) against typical 4-hour schedules, and technicians accept schedules on average 1.92 hours after the scheduled start.
- Transit can exceed half of a schedule (one 5-hour schedule spent 4 hours travelling), trips back to the office accumulate further travel, and delays propagate to subsequent schedules of the same technician.
- The company introduced mobile reminders and proximity-based assignment; schedules with multiple technicians were excluded from the analysis, and the excessive use of the hold status has not yet led to an action.