Investments on facilities and equipment are huge. These assets must be properly cared for and well maintained to achieve their optimum capacities. Though facilities and equipment will break down at some point, but a good facility management practice will implement a number of sustainable maintenance measures that will ensure these assets perform optimally and provide security on safety concerns.

Maintenance is taking efforts and measures to preserve the functions and conditions of facilities and equipment throughout their useful lifespans. Proper maintenance ensures that facilities and equipment are functioning for the purpose for which they are being installed. A maintenance strategy will ensure assets are well maintained to perform optimally.

Advantages of Maintenance

Maintenance is done to:

• Prevent frequent equipment downtime,
• Prevent catastrophic failures, and
• Have fewer emergencies.

In facility management, it is a good practice to prevent failure rather than reacting to failure. A good maintenance program should be adopted in order prevent and effectively management facilities and equipment failure (reduces the likelihood of failure occurring) that will have great negative impact on business operations.

Types of Maintenance

The two general categories of maintenance are:

• Planned maintenance,and
• Unplanned maintenance.

In planned maintenance, the tasks have been predetermined and scheduled while materials and labour will be provided for the tasks upon commencement. Preventive maintenance and predictive maintenance are under planned maintenance. Examples include: retighten loose connections, lubricate moving parts, regular cleaning, infrared thermography, vibration analysis, etc.

In unplanned maintenance, the tasks are done on facilities and equipment that have broken down. Corrective maintenance, run to failure and emergency are under unplanned maintenance. Examples include: fixing broken fixtures, unclog a blocked drain, clean up spillage, responding to emergency cases like fire outbreak, etc.

Why you should avoid run to failure maintenance approach

Always avoid run to failure approach because:

• It will usually cost more than the planned maintenance approach, and
• Facilities and equipment will also not last their expected lifespans.

Facility inspection

Regular inspection should be done on all facilities and equipment. During regular inspections, faults and potential failures at their early stages will be detected, corrected, fixed with minimal work and cost.

Facility users and businesses need smooth operations and that is why timely maintenance must be done and should be in the background.