For all companies that work with equipment of any kind – from ladders to scaffold towers – it is absolutely essential for it to be assessed and serviced regularly.
It is a legal requirement for employers to ensure that any pieces of equipment used for work processes and in workplaces are fit for purpose so as to minimise safety risks. But aside from being a government-mandated necessity, there are also other reasons why servicing should occur frequently.
In this article, we’ll take a look at the key reasons why servicing is so important, and the potential consequences associated with failing to do so.
1. Servicing Prevents Equipment Failures
All machinery, however well designed, will fail eventually. However, while this is undoubtedly the case, servicing equipment regularly will ensure that all faults – or potential faults – can be uncovered early and remedied, thereby ensuring that unnecessary downtime can be minimised, and ensuring that expensive or difficult to obtain parts can be secured in good time. Routine maintenance may seem like a finickity task, especially if no specific issues have been observed beforehand, but it is liable to be incredibly beneficial over time.
2. It Shows That You Are Focused On Safety
A company that services its equipment routinely is focused not only on minimising failures but on ensuring the safety of employees and any other individual that may come into contact with that particular bit of kit. If equipment isn’t checked routinely, and therefore operates for a long time without being assessed or without issues being exposed, it’s far more likely that, at some point, someone will find themselves in a situation where they could get hurt.
3. It Will Enhance The Resale Value Of Kit
It could be that, in the long-term, your business operations alter or evolve. This could make some pieces of equipment redundant, but that doesn’t mean that it won’t be useful for another company somewhere else. If you can showcase that you have prioritised maintenance throughout the piece of equipment’s life and pinpoint all changes/amends that have been made, you will be far more likely to sell it for a decent sum.
4. You Will Showcase To Customers And Clients That You Are Vigilant And Careful
Maintenance and servicing can also be something of a PR win. If a company is able to demonstrate that it is focused on health and safety, as well as operating in a manner that is effective, efficient and designed to keep people secure at all time, its reputation will be massively bolstered.
For any company to run effectively all parts of the operation must run smoothly. If one machine or piece of equipment breaks then the entire line cannot continue, therefore hampering productivity and reducing a company’s ability to bring in much-needed profits.
Get in touch with Ability International for more help and advice on regular maintenance tasks that you should be carrying out for the health and safety of yourself and your team.
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