When planning your MRO budget for the year or month, there are many factors to keep in mind. With repairs, specifically, it’s important to plan for the unexpected, which can be difficult. No one expects their main drive in a production line to fail, but it is bound to happen at some point, and working an unexpected new purchase into your budget can eat up all of the money you may have for that budget period. By choosing repair, you can solve your problems at a fraction of the cost, and often at a fraction of the down time as well.
MRO budgets are budgets in companies especially for the replacement or upkeep of consumable items, industrial equipment, fixtures, office supplies, and other items that are not the end product, but are integral to the production of that product. This obviously includes service and repair to your production equipment. Depending on time, wear and tear, and usage of your drives, motors, pumps, touchscreens, and everything else used in your facility, that production equipment is going to fail at one point or another, which can leave you high and dry with decisions that have to be made quickly. This is where the importance of allocating funds to your MRO budget comes into play.
One of your options for how to allocate your funds is to have an amount set aside for straight forward emergency repairs. Something fails in your facility, everyone goes into panic mode, and you overnight your unit for repair with a turn around of 24-48 hours (keep in mind, this is 24-48 hours you will not be able to run your equipment, which could involve sending employees home and causing you to lose days of production). You may incur after hours fees this way, as well as expedited shipping charges. This should be a last case scenario for any company as it is the most costly way to handle a breakdown, apart from buying a brand new unit with a lengthy lead time!
Another option is keeping a budget that allows you to have repaired units as spares on your shelves, just waiting to replace a unit that goes down. This stops you from having any down time when a unit fails, except for the amount of time to remove the bad unit for repair and replace it with the spare. Working a way into your budget to have these spares repaired and ready on your shelf is an ideal way to ensure that you aren’t incurring extra costs or stress when you have a unit go down. Having a repair company, like Global, that offers a worry free warranty on repaired units is crucial for this option. You want an in service warranty that doesn’t start until the unit is installed into service. This way regardless of how long it sits the repaired unit is covered under warranty whether its two months or two years from the time you get it back.
Finally, the method that most would consider the ideal way to spend your MRO budget is to allot for regular preventative maintenance. This means sending in your key production units regularly to have a technician evaluate and go over them with a fine tooth comb, identify and replace weak or out of tolerance components and potential failure problems. It will give your units a tune-up and having them load tested before sending them back to you with an in service warranty to ensure proper function. This would entail spending your budget every month but knowing that at any time, you have equipment that is ready to bear the load of your production ultimately resulting in less downtime.
No matter how you choose to spend your budget, we want to help you figure out the way that works best for you when it comes to repairs. Do you need us to hold onto a unit for you until your next month’s budget comes through? Want to send all of your units in need of repair at once to save on shipping and then approve them when needed? Not a problem. Call us and let us help you save money and spend it wisely when it comes to your MRO budget.
Please share your comments or questions with us below and be sure to visit www.gesrepair.com or call us at 1-877-249-1701 to learn more about our repair services. We’re proud to offer Complete Repair and Maintenance on all types of Industrial Electronics, Servo Motors, AC and DC Motors, Hydraulics and Pneumatics. Please subscribe to our YouTube page, Like Us on Facebook! Thank you!