Your Facilities Preventive Maintenance Checklist – What to Include
To keep your car in good working condition, you change the oil, get your brakes checked, and make sure there’s enough air in the tires. This routine maintenance hopefully prevents more expensive repairs and helps the car to last longer. The same is true for facilities management preventive maintenance.
Aside from day to day operations, maintaining your building or property in optimal condition is a priority. Having a preventive maintenance plan with regular inspections and repairs will help to keep major building systems and equipment in good condition, avoiding bigger issues or costly repairs down the road.
Why Bother with a Preventive Maintenance Checklist?
Over time, things start to wear out, and regular upkeep is needed. If you’re just beginning to implement a preventive maintenance program, reworking old processes, or overhauling your facilities management training program, start by creating a detailed list of what needs to be checked. This should include major building systems such as plumbing, electrical, HVAC, as well as the general building condition and cleanliness.
Once you’ve established what items and equipment need to be inspected, you can create a preventive maintenance checklist organized by the categories that make sense for your team and your building. Then work these inspections into your monthly or yearly schedule as needed. Getting everyone into the habit of completing preventive maintenance inspections regularly will keep your building and equipment in the best shape.
Having a preventive maintenance checklist and procedures make staying on top of regular maintenance easy, no matter what limitations you might have in terms of staff, time, and budget. Creating a preventive maintenance program will save money by including these planned repairs into your budget and schedule, avoiding the high costs of an emergency repair.
Keep Track of Your Preventive Maintenance Checklist Data
Be sure to also have a way to track repairs and inspections once completed. That way if a larger issue comes up during a facility management inspection, you’ll be able to easily refer back to what had been done previously. If you’re not sure how to organize all of the inspections sheets and forms, and don’t want to manually enter the information into your database, a paperless solution can be an option.
For a routine property inspection, make sure these items are on your building maintenance checklist forms:
General Building & Interior
- Check the condition of floors, ceilings and walls
- Look for leaks or water damage in bathrooms and ceilings
- Check that doors lock and unlock easily
- Make sure that stairs and railings are not loose
- Make sure that exits are clearly marked, with additional signage as needed
- Test smoke and carbon monoxide detectors and change batteries at least once a year
- Check that all lights (interior and exterior) are working, replacing bulbs as needed
- Conduct routine pest inspections and treatments
- Make sure hallways are free of trash or large items that could be a fire or tripping hazard
Exterior
- Walk the perimeter
- Check the condition of the windows and look for any that might be broken.
- Clean debris from the roof and gutters. Check the condition of the roof.
- Clean up any trash or debris on the building grounds.
- Check the condition of sidewalks and parking lots. Have any large potholes or cracks filled.
- Look at the condition exterior paint or siding.
- Check any decks or patios for rot or loose railings.
Building Systems
- Test the fire alarm system and sprinkler system.
- Test the building alarm system, if any.
- Electrical: look for loose wires or fixtures. You will want to schedule a more comprehensive inspection with an electrician.
- Plumbing: check for leaks, signs of water damage and loose fixtures. You will want a more complete inspection with a plumber.
- Check the HVAC or heating and cooling systems.
- Inspect the elevators.
Once your techs have completed their inspections, make sure the data they collect gets sent to the right place. See how a mobile forms automation solution can help with property maintenance checklist forms.