Automating Service Quote Creation for 4T Kitchen Commercial Services

Overview

4T Kitchen Commercial Services provides on-site repair services for restaurants and commercial kitchens. After diagnosing equipment at a customer's location, technicians needed to prepare a repair quote covering labor, replacement parts, shipping, and trip charges.

Preparing a quote required manually researching suppliers, determining the correct labor rate, checking shipping costs, running the calculations, and formatting a final estimate. This typically took around 20 minutes per quote, time technicians didn't have while standing in a customer's kitchen.

The Challenge

A technician visits the restaurant or customer location and diagnoses the equipment problem. From there, before a quote can be sent, they have to:

• Determine estimated labor hours
• Determine the correct hourly labor rate based on the state
• Identify the required replacement part
• Find the part using the part name and/or model number
• Research pricing from multiple commercial kitchen equipment suppliers
• Determine shipping costs
• Add the appropriate trip charge
• Calculate the final repair estimate
• Format the information into a customer-ready quote

That meant jumping between multiple supplier websites while trying to complete work in the field, one of the most common points where quotes get delayed or estimates drift from what a job actually costs.

The Solution

Hive Nova built a custom quoting assistant that technicians access directly through Telegram. After diagnosing the equipment, the technician sends the assistant a company/customer name, state or service location, estimated labor hours, part name, model or part number, and quantity.

The system then handles the rest of the workflow automatically. It:

1. Determines the correct hourly labor rate based on the service location
2. Searches commercial kitchen parts suppliers, including Parts Town, WebstaurantStore, and CPS Ohio
3. Identifies the appropriate replacement part
4. Retrieves current part pricing
5. Determines shipping costs when available
6. Applies the company's trip charge
7. Calculates the complete estimate
8. Formats everything into a structured service quote
9. Sends the completed quote back to the technician through Telegram

The technician then uses the generated quote when communicating with the customer.

How It Works

Example Output

A mockup of the format the assistant returns through Telegram. Not a real customer.

Results

Beyond the headline number, the assistant changed how the team operates day to day:

• Faster quote creation in the field
• Less time researching supplier websites
• Consistent labor and trip-charge calculations
• More standardized customer quotes
• Reduced repetitive administrative work
• Faster response to customers after diagnosing equipment