Ineffective Maintenance Planning - Symptoms & Reasons

 

Nobody can deny the importance of maintenance planning, nor do they eschew the fact that planning is a major strategy in the process of improving maintenance efficiency – it supports effective utilization of resources and increases productive maintenance time. In fact, it’s an integral part of many organizations that are seeking higher reliability, faster production throughput, and lower manufacturing and maintenance cost.

However, there are some who have maintenance planning and scheduling incorporated in their maintenance department but still have failed to reap the desired benefits. Many reasons can contribute to this situation as the notion of introducing planning is not simple as the word seems per se - it’s a discipline that’s difficult to achieve and maintain, this culture needs to be developed more carefully rather than asking everyone – from managers to supervisors and craftsmen, to focus on maintenance planning – ultimately, this chaotic attempt of maintenance planning leads to a naught result.

Maintenance Planning and its Process.

The notion of effective planning is essential for maintenance workload owing to reducing emergency repairs and unscheduled downtime – it helps maintenance personnel by providing everything in detail to complete the task efficiently thereby improving the productivity of the maintenance workforce. Planning in the maintenance department is not just job estimating and work schedule but it's more than that. Maintenance planning is the process of determining what work should be done and how it should be carried out. Planning also ensures the identification and availability of tools and parts that are required for the job.

The planning process underscores the importance of having a dedicated planner for the process whose job is to focus on taking work orders from operations, specifying job scopes, crafts and skill levels, and time estimates, as well as specifying anticipated parts and tools. Maintenance planning consists of the following process:

1- Getting work orders from operations
2- Identify the problem
3- Inspect the asset and premises
4- Determine how work should be performed – make an activity-based plan
5- Secured needed parts and materials
6- Ensured the availability of resources and special equipment
7- Defining required skills for the job.
8- Estimating time to complete a job.
9- Prioritize tasks
10- Schedule and complete work orders by monitoring outstanding work orders
11- Analyze the root cause of the problem and take actions to prevent a recurrence.

Symptoms of Ineffective Maintenance Planning:

Proper maintenance planning is the key enabler in reducing waste and non-productive time along with enabling organizations to carry out cost-effective maintenance at the scheduled times – thereby veering the organizations’ culture toward a Proactive and Productive maintenance program.

Despite the benefits of planning, some organizations are still experiencing several unplanned downtimes, delays, and high stock-outs in the storeroom and that’s a clear sign of ineffective planning. Some notable symptoms of ineffective planning are explained here to know if the maintenance planning in your organization is working fine and the whole team is on right track or not.

1- High Unplanned Works: Unplanned works take a heavy toll on budget and schedule – can cost the company a lot in terms of loss of revenue. A heavy amount of unplanned work is a clear indication that the planner is not working properly on the future work.

2- Frequent Emergencies: One way of determining the effectiveness of maintenance planning. Frequent downtimes and equipment failure have a negative impact on production or on revenue and this interruption indicates that the company may require a more aggressive maintenance program.

3- People Waiting for Tools: A long queue of maintenance people at the store waiting for parts is another sign of ineffective planning. As determining and gathering the necessary parts and tools before assigning the job is the essential part of planning and if this part of planning is rightly done then the maintenance personnel wouldn’t have to waste time in the long queue to collect the required parts.

4- Material Unavailability: When needed materials are not present is the cringiest movement of all and that production delay causes companies to suffer due to the unavailability of the right tool or equipment for the restoration of the fault.

5- Increased Overtime: Ineffective planning and lack of proactive maintenance lead to frequent cases of reactive maintenance - the reason when maintenance personnel is called upon after their working hours – thus increasing overtime cost which impacts on company’s budget, expenses, and revenue. It also affects employees’ health and personal life.

6- High Rework: Frequent reworks on the same equipment indicates quality issues – either poor- or low-quality material is used, or the hasty work causes the reappearance of fault. When there is no proper planning in the maintenance department then the maintenance personnel normally work on a standby basis – they wait until they are needed in emergencies where they have to restore the equipment with absolute minimum downtime – thus this quick fix creates many more problems. 

7- Over-manning: When planning is ineffective you will see over-manning at jobs because the supervisor has no idea about how many persons are actually required for the required task due to the poorly written job scope which doesn’t include details – such as skill levels of the craftsmen required at the job or the time estimation.

8- Maintenance Personnel Waiting at Site for Shutdowns: Another notable symptom that shows the ineffectiveness of the planning department is the lack of coordination with the operations department and other stakeholders.

9- Budget Increased: If the cost of maintenance continues to add up it may be a sign of improper planning as lack of planning results in more emergencies, overtime costs, equipment unavailability, and many more expenditures that can only be reduced if the planner works on future work and the organization focuses on proactive maintenance rather than respond on emergencies.   

Reasons for Ineffective Maintenance Planning

The mission of the planning is to increase maintenance workforce productivity but unfortunately, it’s otherwise for many maintenance departments because of their inability to deal with process subtleties that prevents their organization from yielding productive results.   

1. The maintenance department may not have a dedicated Maintenance Planner for the job instead everyone in the team – from the maintenance manager to the maintenance supervisor is busying the planning process.
2. The Maintenance planner is dedicated but he lacks the required skills – the department may have assigned a planning role to the inexperienced apprentice.
3. Using Maintenance Planner as a technician on an emergency job. Therefore, the Planner plans less work, and less work is assigned so the reactive culture continues in the organization.
4. The maintenance planner is under the control of the maintenance crew supervisor.
5. The maintenance planner only focuses on the identification of tools and materials that are required for the job and keeping it reserved in the storeroom, and if the required tool or material is not present in the store then the planner is responsible for arranging them on site.
6. The maintenance Planner is busied only to ensure that the reserved parts/tools and equipment are reached at the desired location.
7. The planner is involved in quality assurance and quality control of vendor shipment.
8. The maintenance planning department is busy handling the current day’s work and problems. Any problem that arises after the commencement of any job is the responsibility of the craft crew and supervisor.
9. The Maintenance planner is not receiving feedback from the supervisor or technician after every job completion. Feedback consists of plan changes, corrections on initial time estimation, or other helpful information to aid future work. 
10. The maintenance planner is not filling up all feedback and not referring to that feedback while planning future work.
11. The Maintenance planner is chasing parts required for the ongoing tasks instead of planning future jobs for the crew.
12. The planner may not keep useful information in a component level file but keep feedback information of all equipment together in one file. The equipment Database is not organized.
13. Useful information on equipment or component from past years or faults are not accessible to the Plant supervisor or Plant manager.
14. The planner’s estimates are not accurate – they may have built-in delays.
15. The Maintenance Planner doesn’t have an understanding of the workforce capabilities and environment.
16. The Maintenance planner is not providing clear instructions for maintenance jobs so the maintenance personnel has to stop and look for additional information or hop on and off for gathering parts and tools.

Thus, it’s concluded that effective maintenance planning is vital for the improvement in maintenance productivity and organizations must understand the aspects of planning before commencing planning in maintenance in order to avoid frustration in the end. Proper planning and scheduling require professionally trained planners and schedulers, they must have a library of information including equipment manuals, drawings, specifications, and other documentation. It is important for a planner to have technical hands-on experience beforehand for crafting a better work package. Only an experienced planner can effectively utilize the maintenance resources, and improve operational and financial results.