Scenario
When things break down or are not working properly I get a lot of maintenance work requests from external users and customers. Right now it is becoming rather tedious with receiving phone calls and calling back people.
How can I easily get these maintenance requests as well as keep the request submitter updated about the status?
How to use FastMaint to better manage this
You can create and process work requests in FastMaint Professional/ Web/ Cloud editions. External users (for instance equipment operators, customers and so on) can submit requests for maintenance work to be done.
Such requests need to be reviewed by maintenance administrator or maintenance supervisor. They can accept the request and convert to a work order or reject the request or ask more information from the request submitter.
FastMaint can also send email alerts to the requester and maintenance supervisor when work requests are received or processed.
Receiving maintenance work requests
a) Maintenance requests can be submitted by using a browser. The external user will need FastMaint access for this.
b) Or maintenance requests can be submitted by email. No FastMaint access is needed for this.
To submit work requests by email you need to turn this on in the settings. See how to do this below for the different FastMaint editions. You can also turn on email alerts when a work request is submitted or processed.
Processing maintenance work requests
The maintenance administrator/ maintenance supervisor opens up the list of work requests and assigns them to work orders/ rejects them. If more information is needed they can also email back the work requester for clarifications.
To create a work order/ assign request to an existing work order:
Open the work request. Change the work request status to “Assigned” and you can now enter the work order number or create a new work order. Information from the work request is copied into the new work order.
The maintenance administrator/ maintenance supervisor do not need to create work requests themselves as they can directly create work orders (New / Add work order).
Sending confirmations & work updates
In addition you can specify that the work request submitter is kept updated of the status of the work request by email.
This means they will get an email confirmation when the work request is received, when it is assigned to a work order, when completed and so on.
In addition they can reply back to the confirmation emails to update the work request with additional comments. These comments will be automatically picked up from the emails and copied into the work request. That way you do not have to go through each email and do this manually!
Work Request Setting
1. Professional edition:
Administration menu, Settings sub-menu, Requests tab.
Work request submission via web browser (instead of email):
You will need the add-on web based work request module if users want to submit work requests using a web browser or wish to check request status. Please contact us if you are interested in trying out this add-on module for Professional edition.
2. Web/ Cloud edition:
Home page, Administration tab, System Configuration, Work Requests tab.
Work request submission via web browser (instead of email):
You will need give the user a login account if external users (non-maintenance personnel) want to submit work requests using a web browser or wish to check request status.
The only thing these external users with a login account are supposed to be able to do is create new requests, close their own work requests (cancel them) or check the status of their requests. By default members of the “Basic Users” group are treated as external users of the system.
