Services Central How-To Guide

Spend less time getting support and more time focusing on your important work. Services Central has everything you need for service in one place. It allows you to start, track, and share service requests and access relevant service history and manuals, so you can efficiently manage your instruments and equipment.*

You’ll need to have a Thermo Fisher Scientific account to set up Services Central.

For steps on adding instruments to your account, watch this video or follow the steps below
If you already have a Thermo Fisher account, then go to this page and log in as usual
If you don’t already have a Thermo Fisher account, you can set one up for free
- Select Create Account

Create a free account

Enter your first and last name
Enter your business email address
Create a password
Select Yes to receive email updates about Services Central
Select Create Account

Adding instruments

You may see a banner on your Services Central Dashboard or on the Add instruments page which shows if there are instruments associated with your email address.
If you see this banner, select on Go to suggestions

Select all the instruments you want to add and click Add selected to My Instruments

If you don't have any suggested instruments in your account you can add them by selecting Add instruments in the left navigation menu
If this is your first time adding instruments, you can also choose the Add instruments button on your Services Central dashboard

On the Add instruments page, you can add your instruments using Manual entry or Bulk upload (recommended if you wish to add more than 20 instruments)

Manual entry

To manually add your instruments, you will need to:

Enter serial numbers, one at a time
Add a nickname for each instrument (optional)
Select Continue

Review which serial numbers were recognized
Manually correct any serial numbers that were not found or uncheck the box to exclude
Then select Continue

A summary page will show how many instruments were added successfully

Bulk upload

If you prefer to upload your instruments all at once, select Bulk upload

Download the .xlsx template

Copy and paste your serial numbers into the template; you can upload up to 50 instruments at a time
Add nicknames into the .xlsx file (optional)

NOTE: Please review the instructions for formatting the Instructions serial number column to ensure that your instrument serial numbers are imported correctly.

Drag and drop or upload the .xlsx file into the upload box
Once the file has been uploaded, select Continue

Review which serial numbers were recognized
Manually correct any serial numbers that were not found or uncheck the box to exclude
Then select Continue

You will see a summary page showing you how many instruments were added successfully
If you have trouble adding instruments to the Services Central platform, contact us for assistance at servicescentralsupport@thermofisher.com

To share an instrument with colleagues, go to your My Instruments list
- You can navigate to My Instruments by using the left navigation menu and selecting Instruments
Select the Share button in the right corner

You will see a Share instruments pop-up box appear
In the Share instruments box, add the business email addresses of those with whom you’d like to share
Add your message (optional)
Check if you want to share the nicknames
Select the instruments you want to share
Then select Share

Creating a system

Create a system for your instruments that have several components and view them as one unit in the My Instruments tab.

For steps on how to create a system in Services Central watch this video or follow the steps below
To create a system, navigate to your instruments page
Select the instruments you would like to group as a system
Choose Create

You will see a Create pop-up
box appear
Under System, select Create a system

You will see a Create a system pop-up box appear
Fill in the System nickname
You may also add in Notes (optional)
Fill in the System type
Your instrument components should be selected already, but if they aren’t, you can select them under Add instrument components to your system or add additional instrument components
Select Create system

You will now see a new system created in the My Instruments tab under Serial number

Creating a group

Create groups containing any of your instruments and view them as a reflection of your lab(s) in the Groups tab. Some ideas to form a group are: by user or by lab location.

For steps on how to create a group in Services Central watch this video or follow the steps below.
To create a group, navigate to your instruments page
Select the instruments you would like to group
Choose Create

You will see a Create pop-up box appear
Under Group, select Create a group

You will see a Create a group pop-up box appear
Fill in the Group name
You may also add a Description (optional)
Your instruments should be selected already, but if they aren’t, you can select them under Add instrument(s) to your group
Select Create group

You will now see your newly created group or groups under the Groups tab in your instruments page

Requesting service

When you submit an instrument support request, it goes straight to a dedicated support team** that can help you with your problem.

For steps on how to request instrument support in Services Central watch this video or follow the steps below
Select Start a request button in red, on the top right of any screen within Services Central

There you will see a list of request types. In the Instrument support box click on Open a support ticket

Select the instrument for which you want to request support and click on Continue

Provide a Request subject and fill in the Additional details section to describe the problem you are experiencing.
Attach any documents that you'd like to share, such as images, Microsoft PowerPoint files, or data files which could help us quickly diagnose or identify the problem.
Click Continue

Fill out the fields in the Contact information form that aren't already filled in and click Continue.

NOTE: The Ticket contact can be different from the Requestor.

Review your request and click Submit

Once your service request has been assigned a ticket number, you can see the status of your ticket in the Support request history or in the Dashboard.

Activating access control

This feature lets you see and control who has access to your instruments and equipment.

To activate access control, navigate to your Instruments page
Under the My Instruments tab click on Access Management

In the Access Management popup box, under the Restrict instrument access tile click Restrict access button

Select which instrument(s) you want to restrict access to
Then click Confirm

Now you will see a lock icon next to the instrument’s name
By default, you are now the admin for those instruments

IMPORTANT NOTE: It is highly recommended that you assign a backup Admin user for all instruments where Access Management has been enabled.

Managing access requests

When you activate access control and become the admin of one or more instruments, other Services Central users in your organization will have to request access to add those instruments to their Services Central account.

To see pending access requests, navigate to your Instruments page and click on the Pending tab

Click on awaiting my approval
Select the users you want to grant access to the instruments
Click Approve selected

Managing access and roles

You can manage other users’ roles on instruments you manage.

To manage access and roles navigate to the instruments page
Under the My Instruments tab click on Access Management

Click on the Manage access and roles tile

Select the user you want to edit instrument access

If you want to remove a user’s access to a specific instrument, select the trashcan icon
Once clicked, they will no longer be able to access the instrument

Deactivating users

This feature is also where you go to deactivate a user’s account when they have left your organization. Deactivating a user removes their access to all instruments, and deactivates their account in Services Central.

To deactivate a user, navigate to the Instruments page
Click on the Users tab
Click on the user’s email address that you want to deactivate

Click on More actions
Click on Deactivate user

Check the box to confirm you are sure you want to deactivate the user
Re-enter the users email address to confirm it is the correct email address

Click Deactivate user

Removing yourself as administrator

If you don’t want to be an administrator of one or more instruments, you can remove yourself as administrator.

To remove yourself as an administrator navigate to your Instruments page and click on the Access Management button
Click on Stop being the Admin in the Remove myself as Admin box

Select the instruments you want to remove yourself as admin and click Confirm

* Supported instruments and equipment vary by region. Visit thermofisher.com/servicescentral to view the instruments and/or equipment that are supported in your location.

** Support teams respond within normal service business hours, but you can avoid phone queues, hold times, and waiting to open a ticket by initiating your service request 24/7/365. If you have an Asset Management program with Unity Lab Services, please do not use Services Central and continue to manage your service requests as normal via ULS Asset Manager.

Services Central How-To Guide

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