Maintenance Checklists Can Decrease Asset Downtime

Asset maintenance needs vary across public sector fleets. Between differing asset types and usage patterns, it can be difficult to keep up with mounting service needs.

Using customizable maintenance checklists can help fleets better track what type of maintenance is needed for which asset and when, including preventive, seasonal, and asset-specific maintenance. Public sector fleets can quickly and easily build custom checklists with fleet management software (FMS) using detailed asset service histories and inspection data.

Be Proactive with Maintenance Checklists

As automotive technologies continue to evolve, preventive maintenance (PM) becomes more in-depth. While late-model vehicles may need added PM tasks to inspect modern safety features such as lane departure and corrective steering, electric vehicles have a vastly different set of maintenance needs, and high-mileage vehicles may need shorter maintenance intervals. Without a checklist to keep track of each asset’s  —  or asset group’s  —  maintenance needs, fleets can fall subject to higher breakdown and repair instances, causing productivity loss through downtime.

Customized maintenance checklists help fleets keep track of PM needs per interval, including specifications across makes, models, usage, and asset types. For maximum efficiency, checklists should be accessible, regarding both instruction and usability, and should be comprehensive without being burdensome.

Create Customized Maintenance Checklists

Customizing maintenance checklists is a vital part of keeping a fleet asset’s total cost of ownership down while improving asset ROI. Fleets can use historical service and inspection data to create PM checklists and schedules that more precisely meet asset needs.

Inspection and service histories provide insights into high-fail items and unscheduled downtime from which fleet managers can source recurring issues and add relevant tasks to PM checklists for improved uptime.

Furthermore, for assets with upfits that need PM, such as trucks using auxiliary power units or power take-offs, those items can be added to a checklist to ensure all aspects of the fleet are being properly maintained.

While a general PM checklist based on OEM recommendations is a great jumping-off point in implementing better service programs throughout your fleet, it may not take into account additional nuances like the climate and geography a fleet operates in. For example, assets operating in higher humidity areas are more prone to rubber component wear, while colder climate areas increase battery wear.

Additionally, assets operating in urban areas and exposed to more stop-and-go traffic and idling (especially during colder temperatures) can experience faster engine wear. Understanding how operating climates and geographies impact asset wear and tear can help determine additional needed maintenance tasks to build more accurate checklists.

Data Documentation, Collection, and Analysis

The method by which managers provide and collect maintenance checklists can make a big difference in PM compliance and uptime. Solutions, like FMS, provide a platform managers can use to create and customize digital checklists that employees can fill out using the software’s native app. Once submitted, the data from the digital maintenance checklist is automatically collected in the software in real-time.

FMS especially comes in handy when it comes to inspection and service histories. Employees can fill out customizable digital asset inspections via the mobile app, and managers can view automatically aggregated reports based on failed inspection items.

FMS also automatically collects both in-house and outsourced service data and aggregates collected data into configurable reports which can be filtered by categories such as unscheduled and emergency/breakdown services. Having this data front and center helps fleets better determine what tasks to add to specific assets’ maintenance checklists to decrease downtime and improve asset lifespans and ROI.

About the author: Rachael Plant is a content marketing specialist for Fleetio, a fleet management software company that helps organizations track, analyze and improve their fleet operations.