M1 Functions in overview
Maintenance Work Requests
The Maintenance Work Request module is designed to allow operations and maintenance personnel or users who have access to M1 to register concerns or problems that they believe require investigation, repairs or maintenance. The Maintenance Work Requests can be assigned a priority by the originator who enters the Work Request. Work Requests are an essential part of an on-going program of monitoring and requesting special or routine maintenance.
Problems / Faults/ Failures may be reported at any time using the work request screen. The reporting of such problems or faults or failures is facilitated in the system at several transactions throughout the system. These include: while closing a given work order, additional problems are noticed; while performing work order activities/tasks; while updating equipment operating metrics; where a test performed on the equipment fails to pass the standards set. Once captured as a work request with the appropriate description or reason, it enforces a review of the problem and the appropriate action. These work requests support a predictive maintenance approach as in the case of equipment failing a given test.
The processing of work requests follows a set workflow cycle. An operator, a member of the user community or a system user creates a Work Request, which the Maintenance Supervisor must then review them and enter a response or an appropriate action.
The Supervisor reviews the work requests for identification/investigation of the possible true (root) causes. This review may result in the Supervisor assigning a corrective action (Work Order). In other cases, he/she may hold for later review or marks as not requiring any action at that time. The Maintenance Work Order module provides the ability to link work requests to a work order from which they may have been generated. It also provides the link to the Work Order created to perform corrective action.
Maintenance Work Orders
The Maintenance Work Order module enables the easy creation of all maintenance work orders and maintenance of an on-line database, and is the link between the planning and execution phases of the M1 system.
Work Orders in a maintenance environment can be used for a range of different tasks. These tasks include Preventative Maintenance, Breakdown & Repair, Campaign projects and Overhaul. Work Orders Packets are printed documents detailing the work to be done on and parts required for the specific equipment at scheduled times. The packets contain all the necessary documentation for the respective maintenance environment (configurable).
The Maintenance Work Order module is designed to handle the processing of Work Orders for Planned Maintenance, Predictive or Preventative, Breakdown Repairs, Projects, or Campaigns.
Preventive Maintenance
The system supports on-line planning, scheduling and tracking of maintenance activities over a user specified time horizon and generates the planned Work Orders over the specified time period. The maintenance work orders can be initiated on demand or pre-planned.
The Preventative Planning schedule is controlled by a user-defined “Procedure Cycle”, which could be defined in one or more equipment life type metrics e.g. days, miles, run hours, or other operating metrics. In addition, the Preventative Maintenance module supports the preventative scheduling where re-planning of the periodic PM procedures is adjusted by changes in daily average usage of the equipment. This feature is advantageous for equipment that may undergo different operating duties to optimize the cost of maintenance or work order cycle, especially where the daily average runs are either declining or experiencing an increasing spike in activity and not in a steady pace of usage.
Time and Expense
In this module, M1 users can enter their labor hours for work completed on the Maintenance Work Orders assigned to them. This data is used for costing and customer billing for the Work Orders.
Operating Metrics
This is where M1 users enter and update equipment life and usage at frequent time intervals. This data is used to calculate the average usage per day to project the PM work orders schedule
Equipment Configuration
Each piece of Equipment is defined as a unique asset that is to be maintained and is life and serial number controlled. The asset must be identified by their configuration in the plant or by location. An asset/equipment is not consumed in the process of doing maintenance work. It is an asset that will has to be accounted for. Equipment exists permanently until it is disposed of and recorded in the system using the Business One Sales Module.
The Equipment Configuration module describes the technical definition of equipment, its location(s), its hierarchy and the supported maintenance standards. Equipment to be maintained requires a unique identifier such as an ‘Asset ID’ or ‘Equipment No.’. This enables the maintenance cycle to be monitored and its history analyzed. The equipment components may be attached to a larger asset configuration (parent item) and positioned (located) relative to other equipment. All unique characteristics that require definition for the equipment are retained, e.g. life types applicable, and these may be defaulted from equipment type. The equipment may optionally be identified by the location/position in which it is found, thus enabling monitoring the effect of its position on performance.
Maintenance Activities
The Maintenance Activities module provides inquiries into the activities and Procedures used in maintenance.
The data shows the standard times and sequences required to plan, perform and report maintenance work. It includes the definition of maintenance Procedures, and their relationships to Equipment and Equipment Types. It involves the definition of maintenance Activities/Tasks, the teams involved in executing the activity/task, and the composition of Activity/Task Lists for Procedures.
Equipment maintenance may be planned or unplanned, one-off or repeated. Where maintenance is either planned ahead or is of a type that is repeated, standard procedures are defined. These enable projections of resource requirements and realistic scheduling of maintenance. The aim is to maximize the equipment uptime and optimizes the resource utilization.
A library of standard procedures is defined which identifies an associated Bill of Material for the spare parts and an Activity List. The Activity List is a sequence of activities identified from a standard library of activities. These activities are to be executed by a Team (crew) and are associated here for planning purposes. An actual crew may be identified at any time up to completion of the work.
All Equipment has Procedure standards associated with them and it is at this individual Equipment level that the Procedure’s Bills of Material, Life Types, and Maintenance Cycles are maintained. However, users of the M1 System may also define the standard Maintenance Operations, Bill of Materials, Life Types, etc, at the generic Equipment Type (OEM model) level whereby the system will then transfer the setup to the individual serialized Equipment. The system automatically maintains date of last Preventative Maintenance (PM) performance and life at last PM performance. Maintenance Procedure standards established for the type of work type may include activities, materials, tools, safety procedures, instructions, and overhead expense rates. This will enhance the value of the maintenance history data through consistent usage of standard codes and will also simplify data entry.
Warranty Claims
A manufacturer or vendor provides a warranty on equipment or spare parts supplied. This warranty is often expressed in the terms of the operating life of the equipment (e.g. miles, operating hours) as well as elapsed time in days, months or years. Where equipment is under warranty, all of its component equipment and items are also under warranty. Where vehicles and equipment under warranty are repaired internally, then all the costs of the repair (labor and material) are captured to be generated a Warranty Claim.
The Warranty module provides the capability of generating a claim automatically whenever it is applicable, with all supporting documentation generated.
It also allows the user to monitor progress on the claims submitted and to track it through to settlement. Collecting warranty claims can provide a substantial recovery of funds to reduce the total operating costs and is a major benefit of the M1 system. Most organizations do not submit and collect effectively the eligible warranty claims due to them.
This warranty function is integrated throughout the system and it is referenced wherever appropriate.
Billing
The ‘Billing’ module generates invoices for maintenance work orders and creates journal entries in the Sales A/R module of B1. The detail line in journal entries includes the parts, labor, expenses and other charges for each Maintenance Work Order. Users can preview the draft invoice, edit the invoice before generating the final invoice. In the ‘Reports’ menu for Maintenance, users may review and print the invoices.
Reports
A full set of reports are provided for maintenance users as well as management reports with drill down capabilities for tracking Maintenance costs and history. All reports are created using SAP Crystal Reports.
Definitions for M1 in ‘Setup’
Under the Administration module of SAP Business One, users will be familiar with the system setups relating to Inventory, Sales, Purchasing, Financials, user privileges and access etc. System configuration and parameters are defined in SAP Business One Set-up. Under the Setup menu, M1R1 has added a full set of Maintenance Setup screens to enter and manage the set-up data for M1 some of which will tie-in to the other system set-ups for SAP Business One. M1 users can define such parameters as fault types, Bill of Materials, Maintenance Procedures and activities, Charge rates, Authorization Groups and approval procedures for full M1 Maintenance administration and workflow settings.