Preventive maintenance compliance means two things and a site needs both. The first is schedule compliance: the share of preventive tasks completed by their due date, the plainest measure of whether a programme is real. The second is compliance maintenance: the inspections and tests the law, the insurer or the accrediting body require, with records that can be produced on demand. This page takes each in turn, says what record each needs, and shows how one work order history serves both.
Schedule compliance: the figure
Preventive work orders completed on or before their due date, divided by those that were due, for the month. Late completions and open tasks are the remainder. A programme in good health completes most of its tasks on time; one in trouble shows a falling figure and a growing overdue list. The figure is honest only when tasks are dated from their real trigger and closed when actually done; a schedule where due dates are moved to make the figure look better has stopped measuring anything.
What moves schedule compliance
The load against the hours: a schedule that raises more work than the team can do cannot comply. Reactive work crowding out planned work, which the reactive share shows. Tasks with no owner. Annual tasks that arrive without lead time. And the overdue list not being read. The fixes are in the schedule, not in the technicians: level the load, give tasks owners, raise the big tasks early, and read the list daily.
Compliance maintenance: the tests the law requires
Some tasks on the schedule are there because a regulation or an insurer says so: the daily inspection of powered industrial trucks, the periodic test of lockout procedures and energy-control devices, pressure vessel and lifting equipment examinations, fire and life-safety system tests, and industry-specific inspections in healthcare and food. Each has an interval set from outside the site and a record that must show the date, the person, the procedure and the result. A CMMS attaches the checklist and keeps the completed record against the asset; on paper it is the completed checklist filed with the work order.
One history, both compliances
The completed preventive work order is the record for both: it shows the task was done on time, and for statutory tasks it shows what was done and by whom. A site that keeps that record has its schedule compliance figure and its audit file from the same place. A site that ticks a whiteboard has neither, and finds out at the audit or the incident, which is when the missing record is most expensive.
Questions people ask about preventive maintenance compliance
What is a good schedule compliance figure?
One that is rising and that is honest. A figure near full compliance on a schedule that was cut to fit is better than a poor figure on a schedule nobody could do.
Which maintenance tasks are legally required?
It depends on the equipment and the jurisdiction: powered industrial trucks, hazardous-energy control, pressure systems, lifting gear, fire systems and sector rules are the usual set. The site's safety officer and insurer know the list; the CMMS holds the record.
Can compliance maintenance be done by a contractor?
Often it is. The site still owns the record, and the work order for the contractor's visit is where the certificate is filed.