Scheduled maintenance triggers

Overview

Scheduled, planned or preventive maintenance (PM) is a scheduled service visit carried out by a competent and suitable agent, to ensure that an item of equipment is operating correctly, and to therefore avoid any unscheduled breakdown and downtime. Scheduled Maintenance (SM) triggers are a predefined set of actions/results that, when met generate a work order. For example, if we have a weekly PM set up, the SM will trigger a work order for that PM every week. There are 3 possible trigger types in the CMMS, they are as follows:

Time schedule

Time schedules set a clear date and time for when a work order will trigger, such as every Monday, the second of each month, or every six months. In these triggers, you can specify a start date, how often the maintenance triggers, and (if necessary) an end date after which the maintenance no longer triggers. In the example below, we have set a trigger for every Monday at 7:00 AM, starting on September 9, with no end date. This means that new work orders will trigger once a week (on Mondays) at 7:00 AM.

Meter reading

Meter reading schedules are that bit more complex, but just as effective as a time-based trigger. There are multiple ways to trigger a work order from a scheduled maintenance that has a meter reading trigger. Once the meter reading is added to the asset, regardless of how, through a Work Order, directly to the asset itself etc. you will be prompted to confirm the reading as it will trigger a work order.

There are two ways in which you can set a Meter Reading trigger

• Every X of Y: In the screenshot below we have set a the trigger for every 5000 miles. You can set the frequency and reading units. It is important to ensure the reading unit you have set in your scheduled maintenance match those you are adding to the asset. For example, we have a trigger of 5000 miles set, if we add 5000 kilometres reading to our asset the work order will not be triggered.

• When X Is Less/Greater Than Y: You can also set your meter reading trigger to a less/greater than scenario. In the example below we have set our trigger for when a reading of less than 200 gallons is recorded. Alternatively you can set it for when you have a reading greater than a set number. Once the appropriate reading is added to the asset a work order will be triggered.

Note that a new meter reading should be added before closing off the work order.  If the meter reading is left at a triggering level (in this example less than 200 gallons) when the work order is closed a new work order will be generated ~1 hour later when the CMMS reviews all meter readings.

Note: It is important to be certain you are adding the correct reading to the asset, any reading, correct or incorrect that has triggered a work order cannot be deleted.

Event trigger

You can set your scheduled maintenance to trigger at the occurrence of a specific event. Similar in some ways to a meter reading trigger, the event trigger can only be added to the asset through the Metering/Events tab of the asset. Unlike a meter reading trigger you will not be prompted about the impending work order. To set up an event based trigger you simply select the event trigger option, and choose your desired event from the drop down menu.

What are fixed and floating triggers?

A fixed trigger ensures that the next work order will trigger on the predefined date you have set, whereas a floating trigger gives a bit more flexibility. For example, you have a scheduled maintenance with a trigger every 7 days starting on a Tuesday. Let's say your first work order is not closed off until the Monday before your second work order is due to be triggered, so 1 day before your next work order. A fixed trigger will generate your work order on the Tuesday as planned, whereas a floating trigger will push the generation of a new work order back 7 days from the completion of the previous work order.

Adjusting triggers

When a Scheduled Maintenance is live, the system is running a number of background operations in on an hourly basis to ensure the PM is triggered on time. If you adjust the trigger, you need to ensure the system background checks are also reset with the new trigger. To do so, please complete the following steps when adjusting a trigger.

Adjusting dates:

1. Pause your scheduled maintenance.

2. Adjust the dates

3. Re-activate your scheduled maintenance

Switching from Time to meter based trigger:

1. Pause your scheduled maintenance

2. Delete the time-based trigger. This will delete the time-based history associated with the trigger in the database

3. Create a new meter based trigger

4. Re-activate your scheduled maintenance

Switching from Meter to Time-based trigger:

1. Pause your scheduled maintenance

2. Delete the meter-based trigger. This will delete the meter-based history associated with the trigger in the database

3. Create a new time-based trigger

4. Re-activate your scheduled maintenance

Trigger behaviour

By default, a scheduled maintenance will not trigger a work order until the previous work order has been closed. It is vital that all work orders associated with a scheduled maintenance get closed out in the appropriate timeframe or the next will not get created.

It is possible to override this rule and trigger the PM, regardless of whether the previous work order is closed, by checking the Create a new work order even if there are work orders not closed from this Scheduled Maintenance checkbox on the scheduled maintenance: