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The differences between field technicians and technical support technicians can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. While it typically takes 6-12 months to become a field technician, becoming a technical support technician takes usually requires 1-2 years. Additionally, a technical support technician has an average salary of $40,210, which is higher than the $37,520 average annual salary of a field technician.
The top three skills for a field technician include customer service, ladders and test equipment. The most important skills for a technical support technician are customer service, technical support, and patients.
| Field Technician | Technical Support Technician | |
| Yearly salary | $37,520 | $40,210 |
| Hourly rate | $18.04 | $19.33 |
| Growth rate | 8% | 10% |
| Number of jobs | 123,149 | 165,677 |
| Job satisfaction | 5 | - |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 40% | Bachelor's Degree, 40% |
| Average age | 44 | 42 |
| Years of experience | 12 | 2 |
A field technician is responsible for providing technical and maintenance support for the customers by area visits. Field technicians' duties include diagnosing technical problems, replacing malfunction components, upgrading systems for efficiency, running equipment tests to ensure stability, creating draft reports of performed processes, utilizing vehicles and other tools safely, following client's specifications on operating equipment, and adhering to the safety standards. A field technician must have excellent communication and decision-making skills, as well as extensive knowledge of the technological industry.
Technical support technicians are skilled professionals who resolve computer or information technology-related concerns. They may do installations, repairs, or maintenance activities of various applications or computer hardware. They are sometimes assigned specific issues or concerns to resolve so that they will not be bombarded with various issues. This means that they can now specialize in a specific family of concerns. Technical support technicians may provide on-site support, going directly to the person who needs help and doing what needs to be done or troubleshoot the problem in person. They may also be offsite and would usually be manning helpdesk hotlines. Offsite technical support technicians walk the caller through the steps they should do to fix the issues. As such, when a technical support technician is offsite, they are expected to be good communicators and will be able to provide clear instructions.
Field technicians and technical support technicians have different pay scales, as shown below.
| Field Technician | Technical Support Technician | |
| Average salary | $37,520 | $40,210 |
| Salary range | Between $28,000 And $48,000 | Between $24,000 And $64,000 |
| Highest paying City | Washington, DC | Philadelphia, PA |
| Highest paying state | Connecticut | Pennsylvania |
| Best paying company | DCP Midstream | Ropes & Gray |
| Best paying industry | Energy | Finance |
There are a few differences between a field technician and a technical support technician in terms of educational background:
| Field Technician | Technical Support Technician | |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 40% | Bachelor's Degree, 40% |
| Most common major | Business | Business |
| Most common college | - | Stanford University |
Here are the differences between field technicians' and technical support technicians' demographics:
| Field Technician | Technical Support Technician | |
| Average age | 44 | 42 |
| Gender ratio | Male, 88.5% Female, 11.5% | Male, 66.7% Female, 33.3% |
| Race ratio | Black or African American, 4.5% Unknown, 3.7% Hispanic or Latino, 17.8% Asian, 1.7% White, 71.6% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.7% | Black or African American, 10.6% Unknown, 5.4% Hispanic or Latino, 16.9% Asian, 10.6% White, 56.1% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.4% |
| LGBT Percentage | 1% | 11% |