Spares Inventory Policy Development

An effective Stores Inventory Management System needs to focus on the spare part needs of the Assets within the organization and to integrate with, and compliment maintenance activity. The system needs to take into account the issues such as:

• Required spares for Planned Work (Kitting Lists)
• Required spares for Unplanned Work (Breakdowns)
• The effective use of budgetary allowance and the meeting of stock holding targets
• The reported stock valuation in terms of accuracy for accountancy use
• Ensuring stores layout reflecting organizational needs and makes best use of space
• Stores users understanding the importance of the system
• Stores performance measurement
• Ensuring effective booking in and out of stock
• The quick and easy location of items within the stores and ensuring stores tidiness

Thus the implementation of Maintenance Inventory Management must include:

• The development of a Stores Inventory Policy to determine recommended stocks that optimize budgetary & other constraints
• The determination of values for existing and recommended stock following an adopted accounting practice
• The reconciliation of the recommended stock holding against existing stock levels to identify over, under and missing stock discrepancies
• The definition of required PPM Kitting List Spares records
• Re-organization planning of the stores environment to suit organizational needs
• Alignment of the actual stock holding with recommendation over time
• All required data for the operation of the Purchase Ordering system

To achieve these requirements SMP Ltd. can conduct the following for its customers:

Definition of Stores Inventory Policy

A Stores Inventory Policy (SIP) is a written document that details how the Stores Inventory Management system will operate and provides published policies for users of the Stores System to follow to ensure continuing effectiveness. The document includes policies on the following:

• How planned work spares requirements are identified and provided
• How parts holding will cover critical asset breakdown and will be identified
• How available budget will be utilized and how stock numbers and value will be minimized
• Who has responsibility for organization and control
• How stores will be laid out to reflect organizational needs and to make best use of available space
• How spares will be located and identified
• How spares will be ordered
• How stock booking in and out will be controlled
• How data accuracy will be maintained
• How stores system performance will be measured

SMP Ltd. can write and provide a SIP document to meet the operational needs of its customers, draft supporting Work Instructions to provide guidance to system users.

Actual Stock Level (ASL) Definition

Customers often have some existing Actual Stock Levels (ASL) spares holding information, but many items of spares related data can be missing or insufficient. Furthermore a complete stock take of current stock holdings for the maintenance stores is required to accurately reflect the inventory list. To overcome these issues, SMP Ltd. can provide assistance and direction for its Customers to undertake using internal resource(s) a full ASL Stock Take. The Stock Take will result in a detailed ASL definition for the site and this data can be evaluated by SMP Ltd. for the following key elements:

• Available part numbers (site, supplier, manufacturer)
• Asset association(s)
• Descriptions and sub-descriptions
• Current stock levels
• Current location in stores
• Replacement costs and lead-times (where available)
• Units of supply and measurement
• Stock categorization (i.e. definition of ‘type’ of spare part)

The evaluation effort will ensure that all data is consistent and ready for uploading into the HolisTech™ Horizon CMMS.

Identification of Critical Stock Recommendation (CSR)

A Critical Stock Recommendation (CSR) is a definition of which spares are required to be held to support the rectification of critical Asset failure. The CSR is essentially a definition of the required Minimum Stock Levels (MSLs) of spare parts to be held in the engineering stores. “Critical” parts holding should be based on how far down the Asset Criticality Rating ‘levels’ (i.e. Criticality Ratings ‘1’, ‘2’ and ‘3’) available budget will go and be based on:

• OEM recommended critical parts lists
• Historical usage
• Site expert knowledge
• Supplier Constraint information

This CSR will provide the ‘target’ stock holding for the organization.

Reconciliation of Actual Stock Level with Critical Stock Recommendation

Reconciliation of ASL with CSR is essentially the definition of the Minimum Stock Level (MSL) for all parts records currently held by an organization and the identification of new parts that should be held in future. This results in the definition of MSL for:

1. Critical “Required” items (i.e. those that must be ‘on the shelf’)
2. “Recommended” items (i.e. those that it is advisable to have on the shelf)
3. “Not-Required” items (i.e. those that should not be kept in the stores)

The reconciliation process checks the following for each part record:

• If there is an over-stock situation
• If there is an under-stock situation
• If there a no stock situation
• The value of each variable
• Required information is available for computerization

SMP Ltd. can conduct a reconciliation of ASL and CSR for its Customers which will show what changes in the stock holding at the site are required to support Critical operational Assets.

PPM Kitting List Development

Planned Preventive Maintenance (PPM) Kitting Lists are definitions of the spares required for the completion of PPM. In order for Kitting Lists to be automatically appended to PPM Task sheets issued from HolisTech™ and to eventually be automatically ordered by the system, Stock Records need to be defined and set up within the CMMS and these records then need to be associated with the relevant PPM Master Instructions.

SMP Ltd. can complete the following tasks to enable PPM Kitting List functionality within HolisTech™ Horizon:

• Identify all requisite spares Kitting List items for Planned Maintenance Instructions
• Set-up the requisite Stock Records within HolisTech™ Horizon to represent and manage the Kitting List items
• Link the Kitting List Stock Records with the appropriate Planned Maintenance Instructions within the system
• Ensure Kitting Lists for specific Assets are appropriate for those Assets

Computerization of Stock Data

All spares data will then be uploaded to the HolisTech™ Horizon CMMS to include the following:

• All appropriate parts records and data in standardized format
• Details as to the current stocks of these items
• Details as to the current location of these items
• Purchase requirement defined by Min Stock Levels
• Reduction requirement defined by Max Stock Levels
• Disposal requirement for “Not Required” items
• ‘Kitting List’ spares data (identified from PPM)
• Supplier details

Once the stock data has been uploaded into the system the Purchase Ordering module can then be utilized including: (some additional work will be required on PO Sequences)

• Automatic replenishment of stores stock items based on MSL
• Automatic procurement of ‘Kitting List’ stock items
• Procurement of all other Maintenance Function items
• Reporting on all procurement elements (including ‘committed spend’ and ‘actual spend’ over user defined timescales)

Stores Organization Planning

The stores must be organized and laid out to reflect the operational needs of the Stores System and to ensure best support of the PPM regime. To achieve this, stores should be laid out into ‘Process Map’ based areas where Bin Locations will reflect pick slots for part selection purposes. This will provide:

• The ability for Stores Users to easily locate required spares
• An allowance for generics & consumables
• An allowance for temporary storage of PPM ‘Kits’
• An allowance for ‘quarantined’ items
• A secure stores environment
• The best use of available space

SMP Ltd. can provide revised layout plans for the existing stores and a facilitated planning/management of site arranged resource to re-organize the physical stores layout to satisfy the new planned structure. This will provide:

• Tagging and labeling of current stock items
• Racking/Shelving/Bin identification
• Quarantining of unknown stock items for site to evaluate
• Physical spare part re-location

Documentation and Report Writing

This element will be for the completion of documentation demonstrating all completed work. It will also contain the Stores Inventory Policy and should be used as a reference document for stores management.