Vehicle downtime is one of the most expensive occurrences in fleet management. Whether you operate deliveries or field services, when a vehicle is down, you lose the ability to perform at full capacity. A driver may spend the day unable to drive, and your workload must be delayed ore redistributed over the working vehicles.
Fortunately, downtime is less necessary than you might thing. With the right forward planning, you can eliminate or drastically reduce the risk of vehicle downtime in your fleet.
Establish a Preventative Maintenance Schedule
The first step to avoiding unnecessary vehicle downtime is preventative maintenance. Regular maintenance routines will provide the chance to catch issues early and avoid wear-and-tear that will cause issues in the future. You may find opportunities for parts replacement before they break down, therefore avoiding the risk of unpredicted downtime.
Preventative maintenance is proactive and requires both frequent and attentive rounds of maintenance on every one of your vehicles.
Clearly Define Maintenance Steps
Another cause of unexpected downtime is inattentive or imprecise maintenance. You can create a preventative maintenance checklist, but if it's not clear about what needs to be checked, important warning signs may be overlooked.
Clearly define the maintenance steps that should be completed by your team to ensure they are looking in the right places for signs of damage, low fluid levels, and other indicators that further maintenance steps can be taken to avoid downtime later on.
Strategically Stock Vehicle Parts
When a vehicle is down for repairs, waiting for the right part is the most time consuming element. So why wait? Commercial fleet management gives you the opportunity to predict which parts you will need and stock up before they are needed. This strategic stocking can ensure that you have the parts you will most likely need the next time one of your vehicles requires repairs.
Work with your mechanics to build a list of parts to keep on-hand and work with your suppliers to source these parts before they are needed, when you still have plenty of time for slow deliveries.
Rotate Vehicles In and Out of Maintenance
Always keep one vehicle in the bay. Like a sports team has more players than are on the field, rotational maintenance ensures that when one vehicle is down for maintenance, your fleet is not harmed by lowered capacity. Instead, you have the benefit of a backup vehicle that is recently maintained and ready to take over just in case one of your active vehicles is damaged or otherwise needs to go down for repairs.
Maintain a Backup Plan
You may also want to secure a backup plan, just in case more than one vehicle unexpectedly requires maintenance due to an unforeseen problem or even an accident on the road. Knowing where to temporarily source more work vehicles or cultivating partners who can help pick up your workload can be extremely useful in cases where downtime might otherwise occur.
Plan Ahead for Obsoletion
All vehicles will eventually age out of usefulness to your fleet. Don't let that date sneak up on you. Predict the lifespan of each of your work vehicles and plan ahead to replace them when the time comes. You should never hang your prosperity on the continued performance of an aging vehicle with parts that are near the end of their lifespan.
Prevent Fleet Downtime with Wilmar Inc
If you are looking for ways to eliminate vehicle downtime in your fleet, Wilmar Inc is here to help. We are experts at fleet building, vehicle sourcing, vehicle maintenance, and the nuances of fleet management. Contact us today to explore your options to develop a fool-proof downtime prevention plan.
