Maintenance productivity boosted by CMMS

The FUCHS Group comprises about 60 companies and 5000 employees globally. Founded in Mannheim, Germany in 1931, it provides specialist products for a wide variety of applications and sectors. The company prides itself on performance, sustainability, safety, efficiency, reliability and ability to reduce costs for its customers and, at its UK branch in Stoke-on-Trent, it employs more than 300 people who focus on lubricant solutions and customer service.

In order to comply with IATF 16949 standards and the complexity of the plant, the company decided to replace two existing tools with RAM’s specialist solution to improve asset management processes across its UK sites.

Jack Millward, HSEQ Assistant at FUCHS LUBRICANTS (UK), comments: “We needed a maintenance system that would enhance productivity, refine reporting procedures and reduce the time it takes to raise work orders. Our existing software was not allowing us to fulfil all of the requirements associated with IATF 16949 and implementing the CMMS will simplify meeting the guidelines that apply to us whilst helping us to manage our labour force more effectively.” 

Prior to purchasing RAM’s CMMS, the company used SQL-based tools. The requirement for a specialist solution was outlined due to the lack of effective communication between the disparate programs. Millward states: “We used two pieces of software, one for planned preventative maintenance (PPM) and calibration scheduling and another for breakdowns. We identified the need for an all-encompassing package as there was no connection between the existing systems and cross-referencing was not easily accomplished.

“RAM’s software covered all of the requirements that we had outlined.” Millward continues: “The knowledge demonstrated by our account manager and the implementation team has been impressive and all queries have been addressed in a professional manner. We compared the CMMS with other offerings on the market and found that most of the alternatives seemed to be adaptations of document control software that had been adjusted to cover certain aspects of maintenance management. The difference was easily noticeable with RAM’s system, which will provide us with a great platform to manage PPM, work orders and report on breakdowns and labour costs.”

Improved visibility

With RAM’s solution in-place, FUCHS UK will benefit from KPI dashboards and extensive reports providing a greatly enhanced view of downtime, resources used and which areas of the asset base are incurring most costs. This improved visibility will enable the company to make more informed decisions when it comes to repairing or replacing equipment that is proving expensive to maintain.

Millward explains: “Reporting on monthly KPIs was difficult previously and inaccurate data was common due to the lack of communication between our old systems. The new CMMS will give us a complete maintenance management tool in line with IATF, more precise reporting and an easy way for our engineers to schedule calibration tasks wherever they are on site.

“The Android work order management app is something that will improve our maintenance processes further.” Millward continues: “It will provide our engineers with complete access to jobs when they are navigating around the site.”

Configurable alerts ensure users are kept up-to-date with the status of tasks they have been assigned, whilst also notifying them when deadlines have passed. Within the mobile solution, the option to issue and return items will improve equipment monitoring and provide a full audit trail of asset movements.