Planned vs Reactive Maintenance – which is right for your business?

Planned and reactive maintenance are both viable options when it comes to air-con and HVAC upkeep. But which is the right choice for your business?

As we all know, maintenance is the action taken to keep something operating in good condition. In many businesses, there is great value invested in processes and systems running in harmony. HVAC systems are no different. They too require regular maintenance to keep them in tip-top condition.

Businesses rely heavily on the efficiency of equipment to minimise downtime and costs. It only takes one malfunction for your productivity, revenue and business credibility to take a serious hit.

Maintenance also contributes to the longevity of processes and equipment. If you look after something, it will work for longer. In a business sense, if you have invested capital in machinery or equipment such as a HVAC system, it’s important that you maintain its condition so that it can operate at its maximum capability. If you don’t, it’ll take longer for you to see a return on investment (ROI) on that piece of equipment.

So, what’s the best solution? In this article, we discuss the benefits of both planned and reactive maintenance. With a little bit of luck, this should help you understand the importance of the two options, and come to a conclusive answer.

Planned vs Reactive Maintenance

Planned Preventative Maintenance (PPM)

What is planned preventive maintenance?
Planned preventative maintenance involves regular checks being carried out on processes or equipment. This can be completed through a variety of arrangements. The most common is time-based, where checks are scheduled over a specific period of time. Let’s take 12 months as an example..

The benefits of planned preventive maintenance
For an air conditioning system, we recommend carrying out planned preventive maintenance every six months to ensure it’s cleaned, parts are replaced, and the system is tested regularly. Air conditioning PPM allows businesses to know when their equipment will be down and can plan around it. Having a maintenance schedule allows operations to flow more smoothly across the 12-month period.

Planned preventative maintenance also enables us, the contractor, to understand what parts of the system may be worn or have issues before they become a real problem. You, the consumer, can then make sure your equipment runs smoothly at peak performance and safely for longer. As a planned preventive maintenance provider, it allows us to accurately budget for our maintenance costs. Therefore, saving you money.

This type of maintenance will additionally keep your systems operating at a higher environmentally friendly level.

Further benefits of planned preventative maintenance include:

• Decreased equipment downtime
• Improved equipment life
• Reduced overhead costs
• Improved work scheduling
• Improved workplace safety
• Peace of mind

Reactive Maintenance

What is reactive maintenance?
Reactive maintenance is the process of repairing systems or assets to their regular conditions after a poor performance or a full breakdown occurs. The focus of reactive maintenance is on restoring the systems back to working conditions as fast as feasibly possible.

Reactive maintenance fixes are not pre-planned. As a result, this method of maintenance is usually employed for systems that are not crucial for business operations or costly to replace. Although, we appreciate that breakdowns can and will occur on important systems too.

The benefits of reactive maintenance
The most important aspect of reactive maintenance is that it requires less human effort and lower initial costs when compared to planned preventative maintenance.

However, it can be very difficult to establish a budget and maintain an uninterrupted workflow when your system malfunctions. This not only leads to production loss but also disorganisation, as it can be a huge distraction in the workplace.

Moreover, downtime costs could be fatal for small businesses. Imagine a scenario where it’s a very hot day and the HVAC system within the office suddenly breaks down. Employee productivity would drop, clients could be lost, and sales missed. And that’s on top of any repair costs now facing the business.. It doesn’t sound like a fun day.

As a leading HVAC maintenance provider, we advise against over-reliance on reactive maintenance in the long term. Ideally, it’s better to adopt a planned preventive maintenance plan for equipment that is essential for routine operations and production. Nevertheless, if you did want to opt for reactive maintenance, it comes with other benefits, including:

• Lower upfront costs
• No planning time is necessary
• Fewer maintenance staff members required

If you’re still unsure about your current maintenance service or have questions about this please contact us, and a member of our team will do everything they can to help.

In the meantime, follow our journey on LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram for more handy insights.