A work order form template is the shape of the maintenance record, and most work orders forms found online are the request half only: asset, problem, priority, who. The fields that make a work order for maintenance worth keeping are on the other half, findings, parts, times and follow-up, and a work orders template without them produces a stack of job tickets nobody can learn from. This page lists the fields a work order template for maintenance needs, in the order they are filled, and points to the printable version on this site for a team not yet on a CMMS.
The request half
Work order number, assigned by the system or the log. Asset, from the register, with its location. Type: preventive, corrective or reactive, because the reactive share is read from this field. Description of the request. Priority, set by the supervisor from the consequence, not by the requester. Reported by and reported at, to the minute. Assigned to. That is the half every template has, and it is enough to get a technician to the machine.
The work half
Started at, after isolation. Isolation and lockout confirmed, as a tick with the technician's name, because the law wants the record. Checklist or procedure followed, attached for preventive tasks. Findings, in a sentence: what was wrong and why. Work done. Parts used, by part number and quantity. Meter reading, for assets on run-hour intervals. Hours, honestly, including waiting for parts. Returned at, when the asset was handed back running.
The close half
Corrective work order raised, with its number, for anything found that this job did not cover. Closed by and closed at. Any note for the next technician. On a CMMS these are fields on the same screen; on paper they are the bottom third of the sheet, and the maintenance work order template worksheet on this site prints them. A form without a close half is finished when the technician walks away, which is when the record starts being useful.
Why the form matters more than the tool
Every figure a maintenance manager reads comes from these fields: the reactive share from type, MTTR from the times, the repeaters from asset and findings, cost from hours and parts. A CMMS with the fields left blank produces nothing a well-kept paper form does not, and a paper form kept fully produces most of what the software promises. The form is the discipline; the tool is where it lives.
Questions people ask about work order form template
Do I need a different template for preventive and reactive work orders?
No. The same fields serve both; the type field says which it was, and preventive work orders carry the checklist attached.
Should the requester set the priority?
No. The requester describes the problem; the supervisor sets the priority from the consequence of the asset being down. Requester-set priorities are all high.
Can the work order form be a spreadsheet row?
Yes, and the maintenance log worksheet on this site is exactly that: one row per work order with the fields above as columns.