[Nomadia Study]
Home service appointments: people in France lose an average of 3 hours and 29 minutes waiting for a technician

These situations are far from anecdotal: 74% of respondents have experienced at least one disruption linked to a home service appointment. Some had to cancel planned activities (27%), others feared missing the technician by stepping out for a few minutes (23%) or kept checking their phone for fear of missing a call or a message (21%).

The frustrations they report point clearly to this difficulty in planning ahead: 32% criticize service windows that are far too wide and 28% point to the lack of information on the technician’s actual arrival time.

More than the service call itself, it is the uncertainty that generates the most frustration. What people object to is not the technician’s visit, but the impossibility of organizing their day around it with any confidence.

Time off, lost days and lost income: when service appointments spill over into working life

Behind that discomfort lie very concrete consequences for people’s working lives: more than one working adult in two (52%) reports at least one impact on their job during their most recent home service appointment.

To be present, 28% had to use a day of annual leave or time off in lieu (RTT, France’s statutory reduced-working-time days), while 15% took unpaid leave, with a direct hit to their pay. More strikingly, 10% admit to having told their employer they were sick in order to stay home.

The difficulties do not stop there: 19% of working adults had to book a second day of leave because a first visit failed to resolve the problem, while 26% worked from home specifically to be there for the appointment.

Far from a simple matter of convenience, service windows have become a real issue of work organization, productivity and, in some cases, household purchasing power.

Unequal exposure to the same constraint: young workers and single-parent families, the groups hit hardest

While the constraints tied to home service appointments affect the population as a whole, some groups are markedly more vulnerable.

Under-35s are the most affected: 93% say they have already experienced at least one disruption linked to waiting for a technician, compared with 74% on average. They are also more likely to face consequences at work (71%).

The same is true of single-parent families: 93% report having encountered at least one difficulty tied to service windows. More than half of them (54%) also say these appointments had repercussions on the people around them.

Asking a relative to be there, calling in help, rearranging childcare or postponing other obligations: for these groups, the constraint extends far beyond the service call itself.

 The study reveals a form of inequality in the face of time. Everyone waits for a technician at home, but not everyone has the same resources to absorb the constraint. Remote work, flexible hours or an available support network become the factors that determine whether – or not – these appointments disrupt daily life.

“Today, losing several hours waiting for a technician is still considered normal. Yet behind that reality lie sacrificed days off, reorganized workdays and a mental load that weighs on people. What our study shows is that the real cost of a service call no longer lies in the work itself, but in the time mobilized to wait for it. People are no longer just waiting for a technician: they are also waiting for greater visibility and predictability. Beyond the question of convenience, this is also a matter of fairness. When you cannot count on remote work, flexible hours or an available support network, a simple home service appointment can quickly become a real burden. Expectations are shifting: people now attach as much importance to the quality of the experience surrounding a service call as to the quality of the work itself.” said Maxime Dubois, CEO of Nomadia