Planned maintenance services are essential programs for maintaining the quality and effectiveness of your equipment. These services not only save you money but assure your equipment is running at peak performance. Being proactive about servicing equipment allows you to maintain high levels of productivity and prevent any serious repairs. However, it is important to be strategic when choosing planned maintenance services to make sure you select the right equipment maintenance plan and maximize the value and return you will get on your investment.
In this post, we will discuss how planned maintenance services, or contract maintenance, can save you money and which strategies to employ to maximize your ROI.
How Do Planned Maintenance Services Save Money?
Planned maintenance helps your company realize short-term and long-term savings in several ways:
- Increased equipment uptime — Incorporating a planned maintenance schedule for your material handling equipment assures that required preventive maintenance is consistently occurring when it should. This adherence to a planned maintenance schedule will reduce unexpected downtime, increasing your overall production capacity.
- Longer equipment life — By following a prescribed maintenance schedule, your equipment can be expected to run in an optimal manner. It will need fewer repairs overall and will remain in better condition over its lifetime, extending the time before you need to purchase new equipment and increasing the resale value of any equipment that you may sell in the future.
- Reduced risk of injury — Proper maintenance of all equipment, from forklifts to aerial lifts, is a key element of operating a safe facility. By preventing or reducing injuries related to maintenance issues, you keep your workers safe and protect yourself from lost resource time, lawsuits, OSHA fines, equipment shutdowns and more.
8 Strategies to Consider When Signing up for Planned Maintenance Services
By following these eight strategies when choosing a planned maintenance service provider, you position your business to maximize your return:
- Request referrals — Your planned maintenance provider should be able to refer you to other companies they have served. Ideally, they can also show you a work history with companies similar to yours or in a similar industry, so you can feel confident they will fulfill the needs specific to your operation and equipment.
- Ask for a planned maintenance inspection form — If you are already working with a planned maintenance service provider, request a recent inspection form for equipment that was due to be serviced. If you are in the selection phase, ask how they maintain service records, and request a copy of the form or system that they use. If they are unable to answer these questions, you cannot be certain your equipment will be maintained according to the parameters of your service contract.
- Ensure that your provider complies with OSHA qualification requirements — OSHA requires that forklifts and other equipment be serviced by “qualified personnel.” Ask your provider for proof their technicians meet this criteria in order to keep your company compliant with OSHA requirements.
- Be sure that the contract passes the “smell test” — If a contract seems too good to be true, it likely is. Your service provider must pay personnel for time and expertise in carrying out planned maintenance. If a contract rate appears to be too low to support the required resource hours needed to adequately conduct inspections and maintenance, it may mean that services will fall short of the contracted level.
- Request completion rates — Inquire about your provider’s average completion rate for maintenance jobs, and ask how they will handle situations where the rate is not met. If they don’t have these statistics, it is a red flag that they may not be sufficiently diligent about these services.
- Beware of easy answers from your provider — Your service provider should be asking you nearly as many questions as you ask them. If you feel that you are getting too many easy “yes” or “no” answers, the provider may not be as concerned about tailoring their services to your needs as they should be.
- Pay a visit to prospective service providers — A site visit can give you a good sense of how a planned maintenance service operation is run. If their facility is not well maintained or not up to expected standards, you may want to select a different provider.
- Review the provider’s expertise — Ask the provider questions to understand how long they have been in the planned maintenance business, how their technicians acquired their training, and whether or not they are able to service different makes and models.
At Equipment Depot, our 850+ factory-trained, certified technicians spend over 360,000 hours per year helping our customers maximize productivity across their operations. To learn how our planned maintenance and forklift repair services can help you, contact us today at 888.EQDEPOT.
