Best tips of optimizing and managing spare parts inventory

Corny jokes apart, though it may look like small potatoes, quality spare parts stock management is crucial to the achievement of any maker or maintenance group. After all, inferior spare parts management and planning may result in inefficient inventory storage along with a lack of components if you want them, which induces unplanned downtime and unexpected expenses.

Therefore, for your general success of your organization, it is in your very best interest to purchase optimized spare parts stock management, beginning with these nine suggestions.

Also check- Geberit

1. Pick a Way of Labeling Critical Components 

Even though it may appear obvious, it is still worth saying: The first step to tackling your spare parts stock would be to clearly label every element so there is no question about what’s what. This is particularly crucial for critical parts — which are, spare parts booked for machinery crucial to business operations. There are two popular techniques for stock categorization and tagging: ABC evaluation and XYZ evaluation.

2. Balance Inventory Volume with Sawtooth Diagrams 

Among the most crucial spare parts stock management best practices to follow would be to keep a balanced stock quantity, though that can be easier said than done. Implementing ABC and XYZ investigations for spare parts stock categorization is a beginning, but a saw tooth diagram can help you contextualize the way your inventory stock is depleted and replenished over time.

The y axis of this diagram must signify the stock amount, whereas the x axis must represent time. The lines which constitute the “saw teeth” must signify the continuous decrease of stock with time.

Each peak represents the highest stock level, and also the distance between each peak represents the quantity of time between imports, otherwise called the cycle period. Additional markers inside your saw tooth diagram ought to signify the reorder point and direct time.

3. Maintain Your Bill of Materials up to Date 

The bill of materials (BOM) is the winning formula for producing an end product that’s light-years before its competitors. Because of this, it is critical that you maintain your BOM current so as to stop stock inaccuracies and spare parts shortages and to plan for preventative maintenance or servicing. Make the time to examine your own BOM on a routine or semi-regular foundation to include or remove parts from it as required.

4. Calculate Optimal Economic Order Quantity 

Based on Investopedia, economic order quantity (EOQ)”will be the perfect purchase quantity a corporation must buy because of its stock given a set price of manufacturing, a particular demand rate, along with other factors,” and also” is completed to minimize inventory holding costs and order-related expenses.” 

You can use EOQ to ascertain the quantity of spare components you want to order according to yearly requirement by using the following formulation:

5. Grow a Normal Work Order Procedure 

Producers will sometimes store surplus parts in a rarely used section of the warehouse without needing to tag them at the organization’s stock control system. Other instances, workers will neglect to submit a formal work order before removing a product from stock to fix or support equipment.

Such oversights may result in inaccuracies in your spare parts inventory documents, which might cause difficulties further down the road.

6. Concentrate on Inventory Control throughout Employee Coaching

You cannot reasonably expect your workers to adhere to all procedures and procedures pertaining to spare parts stock management to the correspondence when they were not adequately trained to do so.

From online classes to seminars, you can find numerous training programs to pick from; it is in your very best interest to pick one which covers both conventional procedures and processes, in addition to any technology that your company may use to maximize spare parts stock management.

7. Play Cycle Counts on a Regular Basis

Among the most effective approaches to guarantee inventory accuracy in your warehouse would be to run cycle counts (audits of particular product groupings) through the year.

Luckily, there is always Hitachi Solutions Parts Forecasting. Parts Forecasting is a CMMS made to accomplish optimum stock levels so as to decrease components overages and shortages.

Parts Forecasting extends Hitachi Solutions’ heart Field Service supplying innovative information and analytics, and utilizes enterprise resource planning, smart machine learning, and IoT to supply precise spare parts stock and demand forecasts.