One of the most popular features of Maintenance Care’s CMMS is preventative maintenance scheduling. Proactively inspecting, cleaning, replacing and repairing equipment in your facilities will keep them running longer and mitigate costly surprises that can shut down your operations for some time.
Using PM schedules to set recurring tasks ahead of time will keep your team on top of periodic or proactive maintenance to your most critical assets. Utilizing software to organize your schedules and pre-set task assignments makes project management, productivity and team collaboration much easier.
This month, we hosted an exclusive What Is Preventative Maintenance? webinar to walk through the basics of this powerful tool for new (or upgraded) Maintenance Care users, as well as show our seasoned customers a few tips and tricks for making the most of this highly used feature.
Key Insights:
- Users can add specific details to their PM, such as notes, trigger dates and schedules, to provide clarity to the entire department.
- The system allows users to filter tasks by various categories, such as “active” or “paused” tasks, by keyword and view for ultimate customization.
- Preventive maintenance scheduling helps facilities maintain compliance and prepare for audits and inspections.
- Customers can adjust their settings to take their preventive maintenance alerts on the go through the iMCare mobile app.
Senior Trainer Susan Fowler led webinar attendees through a guided walkthrough of preventative maintenance in their CMMS with a detailed breakdown of each task in a range of possible scenarios. She demonstrated how to adjust settings to navigate the system based on personal preferences and company needs. Host and Moderator Dino Roberge kicked off a Q&A session for Maintenance Care customers in attendance, resulting in additional insights and takeaways.
Takeaway 1: The Importance of Preventative Maintenance in Facility Management
Preventative maintenance can either be compliant, regulatory, scheduled or all of the above. The webinar introduced Maintenance Care's scheduler tool, which allows users to set up and manage preventative maintenance tasks for this crucial element of facility maintenance management.
Susan further outlined how users can view and manage their scheduled tasks using the software’s task page. She demonstrated how to use the scheduler to create, edit and activate PMs, noting: “The scheduler is basically a holding cell for all of your preventative maintenance to trigger on the date and time that they're supposed to.”
Takeaway 2: The Power of Filters and Adjustments
The webinar also emphasized how Maintenance Care's software allows for effective filtering and task adjustment.
Susan explained how individual work orders and system-generated preventative maintenance tasks can be distinguished and filtered using the “Submitted By” column, ensuring a streamlined view of all maintenance work needed.
"You have the ability to see both a planner and a chart,” she said. “It’s also easy to adjust your column settings.”
Takeaway 3: The Scheduler and Planner View
The webinar highlighted the scheduler's role in managing preventative maintenance tasks. Fowler demonstrated how to use the scheduler to edit and activate tasks, explaining how users can specify the timing, frequency and nature of tasks during the setup process.
Susan explained, "You have the ability then to determine whether they're daily or weekly, monthly, quarterly... You can adjust the schedule to anything that you want."
She also showcased how to add new preventative maintenance tasks in the scheduler and advised on adding the timing in the task title to aid in future searches.
Additionally, Fowler explained how the scheduler's “Planner” view provides a calendar view of active preventative maintenance tasks. This allows users to see upcoming tasks at a glance and make necessary adjustments to their schedules.
"The planner is a really good way to do checks and balances between your scheduled list and what you have active," she said.
Takeaway 4: Adjusting Preventative Maintenance Tasks for Specific Circumstances
Susan also addressed adjusting preventative maintenance tasks for specific circumstances, such as holidays or certain days of the week. She advised incorporating these adjustments into the scheduling process to ensure tasks are completed smoothly.
"You want to make sure that it is triggering on the dates and times that you want it to,” she said.
She suggested triggering tasks for Tuesdays or Wednesdays when technicians are settling into the week. She also advised that the system does not recognize specific holidays — just the dates. Users can make adjustments from the “Planner” view to ensure triggered tasks do not fall on a holiday or weekend.
Takeaway 5: Utilizing the Mobile App for Maintenance Tasks
Users can access preventative maintenance tasks via the iMCare mobile app, which is a companion of Maintenance Care’s desktop version. Susan recommended adjusting filters and checking off completed tasks in the app to best optimize how your upcoming workload is displayed.
To further customize PM activities in the mobile app, Susan recommended reaching out to Maintenance Care’s abundant support resources, highlighting the numerous options available, including a customer support number, email, chat and an online wiki with step-by-step visual instructions.
Maintenance Care is hosting monthly webinars throughout the year to detail every feature and walk through the capabilities of our CMMS. Interested in joining our customers-only virtual events? Current users should keep an eye on their inboxes for invitations each month. To sign up for Maintenance Care, get in touch with us today!
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