An Alternate Way to Save;

Last year ModernControls approached a long time customer that operates 7 facilities with a request to increase the scope of work in their preventive maintenance agreement. After performing a review of the repairs from the previous year we identified the 3 locations that had the most potential for savings. We showed the Facility Director what we had found and laid out a detailed plan to reduce the cost of service. We found that the 4 facilities where we did the most preventive maintenance the costs were the lowest. In the other 3 facilities the cost of service calls to complete routine maintenance, general repairs, and overtime to service units was the highest. The Facility Director agreed with the analysis and we increased the scope of preventive maintenance.

This year he requested an analysis to justify the additional money he spent on maintenance the previous year. ModernControls provided a detailed cost breakdown that showed a 30% reduction in the total expense for HVAC repairs and preventive maintenance in the 3 buildings. That 30% amounted to more than $ 75,000.00 in savings. The facilities director was recognized in a recent board meeting for his overall reduction in the cost of maintaining the facilities. We all knew we had done the right thing but the dollar figure was over the top. Our industry has been so focused on reducing energy consumption that we haven’t tried to quantify the potential savings of preventive maintenance. Until now.

ModernControls recently invested in a software program that will allow us to build a database over the next few years that will perform this type of analysis automatically. Our hope is that the information we started collecting will be the beginning of a long term commitment to our customers. We changed our standard Work Orders to start collecting more information and we update the repair status and resolution as we go. It added a few steps to the process but the information should allow us to zero in on problem pieces of equipment so that we can provide better advice to our customers. When factoring in the operation efficiency of existing equipment to show a payback for replacement it also helps to factor in the cost of repairs and maintenance. If you’d like to learn more feel to stop by our office.