Maintenance management is the management of machines and equipment the proper way by ensuring timely servicing, functional checks, and repairing of the instrument if required. Maintenance may also involve the replacement of parts.
Maintenance management is an important task for different types of industries. As industries require the support of different types of machines and other equipment proper and timely maintenance is essential to avoid the wastage of money.
Maintenance will help a business in multiple ways.
1. It helps the business to avoid damage to the machines
2. Ensures efficient functioning of the machine
3. Prevents financial loss due to the damage of machines
4. Avoids the wastage of labor as workers won’t be able to work without machine support
5. Helps to maximize the operational period of the machines
Different types of maintenance
In industry, we come across two main types of maintenance operations.
1. Preventive Maintenance
2. Corrective Maintenance
Preventive Maintenance: It is the maintenance including functional checks and servicing before a machine encounters any technical issue. Usually, preventive maintenance is carried out on a regular basis to avoid damage to the machine.
Corrective Maintenance: Corrective maintenance as the name indicates corrects technical issues. Corrective maintenance is initiated when we encounter a problem with the machine. The experts then check the machine and make it functional.
ERP for maintenance Management
ERP or Enterprise Resource Planning Software is a tool that can be of great help to the industries. Whatever be the tasks to be performed, ERP solutions offer comprehensive support. ERP can assure support for accounting, human resources management, manufacturing operations, and yes, maintenance and repair operations.
ERP for maintenance management can assist a business, especially those involving a large number of small and large machines and other instruments. The ERP tool supports proper documentation, maintenance request management, and all other tasks involved in the maintenance of machines.
Let us find out key benefits of ERP for Maintenance Management
Benefits of ERP
Support for managing maintenance teams
ERP tools offer you the best platform for managing a maintenance team. The teams responsible for managing different types of maintenance operations and different types of equipment can be managed with ERP assistance. Creating a maintenance team and managing the maintenance tasks becomes effortless with ERP. We can also make sure that these teams and team members are completing their tasks on a fast track basis. There could be different types of maintenance teams who carry out the repair work including external maintenance team, internal maintenance team, emergency support team, etc. Besides, there can be separate teams for managing computers, machines, etc.
Easy to raise maintenance request
We have already discussed two types of maintenance works- Preventive and Corrective maintenance. We will need to raise requests for different types of operations. An ERP will equip you to raise maintenance requests in an e-platform and communicate your requirement to the maintenance team. We can also mention the type of maintenance and hence make the maintenance team understand the emergency of work. As ERP will enable us to quickly communicate our requirements to the maintenance team the whole process gets completed soon.
Equipment and equipment categories management
The industry will have to manage different sets of equipment for easy functioning. Work centers and offices will require the support of computers, machines for manufacturing processes, etc. IF we take computer-related instruments we will have a printer, scanner, and other support systems. You will have to manage all these types of devices into different groups. Categorization can be made based on the manufacturer of the device and the type of the device. An ERP will enable you to list all these items along with the number of items, warranty period, maintenance schedule, etc.
Analyze the performance
The majority of the ERP solutions offer support for analyzing the performance of the employees. The number of maintenance requests generated and the number of maintenance requests settled can be evaluated with the ERP tool. We can also make use of the ERP reporting facility for improving our maintenance system. The support system will also assure you get a glance at the total number of maintenance requests generated, the machines repaired and scrapped. We can also assess the status of the maintenance requests assigned to different employees.
Quick configuration
You don’t have to manage different log books or files to manage the list of equipment and maintenance schedules once you start using ERP for the process. ERP will help you to quickly configure maintenance teams and equipment categories. Different maintenance teams can be configured to help the people easily identify the team that is responsible to carry out the maintenance operations of the equipment. In the same way, the managers can create equipment categories and assign the categories to different maintenance teams.
Easy documentation
When you are managing a huge industry it is not easy to document all your activities. At the same time, you will have to document all the work from the simplest tasks to the most difficult ones. With an ERP system in hand for your support, you can document all maintenance-related activities easily. It will help you to record preventive and corrective maintenance activities and the maintenance calendar. The completed maintenance works, ongoing and new works can be listed the most efficient way.
Quick scheduling support
Planning maintenance work is important for the completion of the work in a timely manner. We can plan and schedule all preventive maintenance work in advance as it is pre-planned. Once the request for corrective maintenance is raised those requests can also be scheduled based on its priority and emergency. This will help the maintenance team to complete the work systematically. We can also guarantee that no work is missed out and no equipment remains dysfunctional affecting the labor hours. Proper maintenance also helps us to avoid severe damage to our machines. ERP can help you synchronize all maintenance and repair-related operations and ensure that your work centers and offices function efficiently throughout the year.