Creating specification for an asset

If you have a rotating asset defined (by associating a rotating item to it), then you cannot associate the specification to this asset. You can associate the specification to the item and during association of item to the asset, item’s specification will automatically get copied to the asset along with attribute and their values.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Contracts rates Vs rates on PRs/POs

If you have mentioned a direct issue item with rate (unit cost) & suggested vendor in a Work Order and approved it. If there exists a contract for the same item and also during reordering process, if Consider Contracts When Creating PRs/POs? checkbox is checked, MAXIMO’s reorder process will ignore the rate and vendor mentioned in Work Order, and will consider the rate and vendor from Contract.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Filtering records in maximo

You use List tab in an application to search a particular record based on search criteria mentioned in list tab or advanced search. Hence, you can search for all the approved Work Orders by mentioning status as "APPR" in search criteria, which internally works as SQL LIKE statement. 

If you want to search all the work Orders which are either waiting for approval or are approved, you can mention "WAPPR, APPR" in status field of search criteria, which internally works as SQL LIKE OR statement.

Similaly, you can mention "=WAPPR, =APPR"  or "%APPR%".

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Duplicating a record in maximo

Maximo provide a functionality to duplicate an existing record (like Work Order, Assets, Location, etc). By using this, MAXIMO copies almost all the information from the existing record into the new record. Some of the fields which are very specific to the existing records are not being copied like Schedule, Target Dates in a WO.

If you have created some extra customized fields in an application, then new field information also get copied to the new record.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Generating PM Work Orders based on Meter Readings

You can generate the PM Work Orders automatically on updating the meter readings instead of based on estimated dates. In order to achieve this you need to check following two check boxes in PM on Frequency tab:

• Generate WO Based on Meter Reading (Do Not Estimate)?
• Generate WO When Meter Frequency is Reached?

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Addition of Invoice charges to Work Order actuals

If there is variance between PO & Invoice price, on approval of Invoice, the variance amount get added to the actuals to the Work Order. Even if the Work order has been closed, the variances get updated.

However, if extra services such as freight charges etc are received in a separate invoice and if WO has already been closed, they cannot be charged to WO.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Ordering Direct Issue Materials in maximo

If you cancel a PR which has WO reference (because of direct issue materials), the planned items on WO become available again for re-ordering. The PR cancellation process removes the PR reference from WO.

If you convert a PR, which has WO reference (because of direct issue materials), into a PO and then approve the PO, maximo closes the PR. If you cancel that PO, maximo re-opens the PR. No impact on WO, because you can again convert that PR into a new PO.

If you cancel a WO which has direct issue items, and a PO has been raised for those items, maximo gives you a warning that a PO exists for this WO but you can cancel it. If you go ahead with the WO Cancellation, you cannot receive the material against the PO. However, if you close the WO instead of cancel, you can receive the material against closed work order.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Working on Tools

You can store/reserve the tools in maximo. There are two applications to support tools functionality “Tools” & “Stocked Tools”. The Tools application is similar to Item Master application and Stocked Tool similar to Inventory.

All the features applicable to item/inventory functionality are available to tools with exception of reordering.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

How is Required Date for an item in Work Plan populated

The Required Date for an item in Work Plan Materials tab is populated by Schedule Start Date for the 1^st time. It works in following way for different kind of items:

1. Stock Items – Required Date is read-only and gets populated by Schedule Start Date for the 1^st time. Further changes to Schedule Start date do not get a reflection in Required Date. However, during material reservation on WO approval, the materials get reserved as per the Schedule Start Date bypassing the required date.

2. Direct Items – Required Date is editable and gets populated by Schedule Start Date for the 1^st time. Further changes to Schedule Start date do not get a reflection in Required Date. You can manually edit this date and PRs get generated based on this date (Required Date).

In both the above cases, if Schedule Start Date has not been specified, then Target Start Date gets defaulted to Required Date. If both the dates are present, then Schedule Date takes precedence over Target Date. If none of the date exists, then system date is defaulted.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

How To Suppress PM Work Order Generation

If you do not want to generate the work order from a meter based PM based on estimated value, then you should check both “Generate WO Based on Meter Reading (Do Not Estimate)” & “Generate WO When Frequency is reached” check boxes.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Field Values While Creating Workorder From Preventive Maintenance

If you create a Work Order from a PM, which has a Job Plan attached to it, Maximo copies the Job Plan’s Duration to Work Order’s duration and also populates the Target Finish Date as target Start Date + Duration. However, manual creation of Work Order does not follow this rule.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Issue And Return Of Materials On Work Order

You can return a material which was issued from inventory to Work Order. You can do so by inserting a new row in Work Order Material Actuals tab with Transaction Type as “Return”. However, if the issue to the Work Order was because of a direct-issue item, then you cannot use the Work Order Material Actuals. In this case, you can return the material to vendor by using Receiving application. Provide PO Number against which the material was received.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

How Maximo Avoids Creation of Duplicate Work Orders

If you create a work order on an asset/location with a failure class & problem code and if there already exists a work order with same combination (asset/location, failure class & problem code), maximo gives you a warning stating that problem has already been reported. You can skip the creation or go ahead with the creation.

This is optional, depends upon the organization settings under Work Order Options>>Other Organization Options>>Display Duplicate Problem Warning section.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Some Tips on Applying a Job Plan / Route to a Work Order

Ø       Attaching a Job Plan to a work order creates task work orders for the operations mentioned in the job plans. All these work orders inherit the location and asset from the work order (main) to which job plan was attached. These work orders also have the parent as the main work order.

Ø       Making a work order as parent to an existing work order does not inherit the location and asset to the child from parent.

Ø       Applying a route to a work order creates Child Work Orders (not the task work orders) for route stops mentioned in route definition. If a route stop has job plan attached, there will be task work orders (Activities) created, for the operations mentioned in job plan, attached to the child work orders created earlier.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Capturing Cost On Work Order

If Asset and Location both have their individual GL account defined on them, and when you create a WO on asset, the GL Account field in Work Order gets populated by Asset’s GL. If the asset does not have any GL Account, then this field gets populated by location’s GL.

If the Work Order is being created by a PM, then the PM’s GL Account takes precedence on asset and location (i.e. gets defaulted to Work Order). If PM does not a GL defined, then asset’s GL takes precedence. If asset does not have a GL, then location’s GL take precedence.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Work Order Status Flow

The Work Order Cycle has the following main statuses:

WAPPR: Work Order Waiting for Approval. WOs are created in this status (Quick Reporting WOs are created in INPRG status).

APPR: Work Order Approved. Materials are reserved at this status.

WMATL: Work Order Waiting for Materials. After approval, if there is a PO for materials required to execute the WO which has not been received yet, the WO will remain in this status.

INPRG: Work Order In progress. Indicates that WO is being executed (Actual Start Date gets auto-populated).

COMP: Work Order Completed. Indicates that WO execution is done (Actual Finish Date gets auto-populated).

CLOSE: Work Order Closed. All reviews are done and WO is electronically closed.

You can directly go from WAPPR to CLOSE, bypassing all intermediate statuses. Same logic holds good for INPRG and COMP.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Working On Start Center Result Set

If you use an application very frequently and want a specific set of its records be displayed on the first screen after login, you can configure the Start Center to get something like this.

Step 1:

Go to the application who’s data (records) you want to extract.

Make a Query to pull the specific record set and save it (need not be public).

Lets say, the application is Work Order and the where clause is the Owners = Inventory Team

Step 2:

Go to Start Center/Change Layout and Configuration/ Right Column

Select Content = Result Set

Finished

Step 3:

Go to Start Center/ Result Set – pencil icon (Edit Port let)

Select Query created above

Select Chart Options

Show Chart by Default?   Yes   

   Chart Type                 Bar (in this case)

   Display By                 Status (in this case)

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Some Rules on Work Order

Ø       Reservations are cancelled if a Work Order is closed.

Ø       Reorder routine does not consider the items from a closed WO.

Ø       PR generated for a WO cannot be approved if WO (with a direct issue item) requesting that item has been closed.

Ø       PO generated for a WO cannot be approved if WO (with a direct issue item) requesting that item has been closed. Anyhow while closing the WO, maximo will notify that an open PO exists for it, but will let you close the WO.

Ø       If you try closing a WO which has been referenced in an open PO, Maximo gives warning but does not force.

Ø       Even if the PO is approved, receipt is not allowed for a Closed WO.

Ø       Items cannot be issued using Inventory application to a cancelled or closed Work Order.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Working With a Work Order Record

You can delete a Work Order, if it is in WAPPR status. If you approve a Work Order and un-approve to bring it back to WAPPR, then you cannot delete the Work Order record.

If a Work Order has ever reached to APPR, you cannot delete it. When you close or complete a Work Order without approving it, maximo internally treats it as approved before closing (or completing). You will anyhow not see this in Work Order History.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

The Resources Module in Maximo [People, Person Groups, Crafts, Labor, Qualification]

The Resources module in maximo has got following applications:

• People
• Person Groups
• Crafts
• Labor
• Qualification

Every Maximo user should have a person record associated with it in maximo. You create the users using Security Groups Application. When you create a user, maximo automatically (optionally) creates the person for that user.

A labor record also should have a person record associated with it. Use People application to create a Person record.

A person group consists of people who may or may not be labors.

Qualification application is used to specify the certifications, licenses. Labor records can be linked with qualifications.

A person who has a record in People’s application may or may not be a labor.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Working With Priorities- Continued

If the Work Order is being created by a PM, then the PM priority takes precedence on asset and location (i.e. gets defaulted to Work Order). If PM does not have a priority defined, then asset priority takes precedence.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Working With Priorities

If Asset and Location both have their individual priority defined, and when you create a WO on an asset, Location gets populated. The Asset/Location priority field in Work Order gets populated by Asset priority. If the asset does not have any priority, then this field gets populated by location priority.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Who Pays For The Work Order

If “Charge to Store” field on Work Order is checked, the cost of the work order shall not be charged to Asset on which the work order is written. You can see this value in the Inventory Cost field available on the asset.

If the asset on the work order is a non-capitalized rotating asset not located in an operating location or a storeroom, Maximo selects the check box; otherwise this check box is cleared.

If the work order has been written on a location (without an asset), you cannot select this check box.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Interaction Node in Maximo Workflow

In MAXIMO Workflow you can design workflow process wherein one workflow process can call another. This is facilitated through the "Interaction Node". The second process is NOT a sub process of the first one but an altogether individual one.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Creating Users And Custodians For an Asset

In maximo, you can specify a user and a custodian for an asset or location. There can be multiple custodians and users for an assets or location. You can also make one of the user/custodian as primary. A user is normally a person who uses the asset/location (like the persons in operations). A custodian is normally a person who owns the asset/location (like the maintenance personnel).

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Work Order Classes And How to Create These Types of Work Orders

 There is a read-only field “Class” on Work Order Screen. There are following four types of Classes:

• Work Order – Populates when you simply create a work order
• Activity – Creates when you create a task (basically a task work order)
• Change – When you create a change to specify that some more work needs to be done. (This is actually a follow-up work)
• Release – When you create a release. (This is also a follow-up work)

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Cannot Log Actuals Against a Work Order

If the Accept Charges check box on Work Order is not checked (cleared), you cannot report any actuals against this Work Order. You can also not plan for any direct issue material for this Work Order.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Edit-ability of Actual Start and Finish Date of a Work Order

If you change the Work Order status to INPRG, Maximo populates the Actual Start date by system date&time. However, you can edit this date. Maximo will prevent a future date in this field.

If you change the Work Order status to COMP, Maximo populates the Actual Finish date by system date&time. However, you can edit this date. Maximo will prevent a future date in this field. This date should not be less than the Actual start date.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Task Work Orders in Maximo

The task workorders are distinguished by normal workorders by a database field in WORKORDER table known as "ISTASK". If this field is set to "Y", i.e. the workorder is a task. You cannot attach a workorder to a task workorder as its child.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Work Packaging

Work Package functionality allows us to combine multiple Work orders (irrespective of their individual statuses) by assigning them to a new parent Work Order. This parent work order does not have any asset/location or GL and will be in WAPPR at the time of creation.

Use Work Order Tracking application for this. Go to list tab, search for the work orders which you want to group, based on some common characteristic. Select all/few of them, click on the Action Item "Create Work Package". Maximo will create a parent WO in WAPPR without any asset/location, having all the selected WOs as children.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Location Systems in maximo

SYSTEMS in maximo is a logical grouping of locations. In order to have a location to be a child/parent of another, both the locations should belong to a system. Use "Associate Systems with Location" action item available in Location application for this. Within a system, there can be only one top level location. All other locations within that system should be children of the top level location.

One location can have more than one parent, but not in same system. One location can belong to multiple system and have multiple parent in these systems.

You can have a child location as parent of its parent, provided the system to which all of these locations belong is "Network".



Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

GL Account Setup and associated tables

If a transaction in MAXIMO involves cost (e.g. Work Order actuals), the cost need to hit a GL account (rather two, debit and credit). In order to setup the GL accounts, following steps need to be taken in sequence:

1. "GL account configuration" action item in "Database Configuration" application. Here you specify the number and details of segments, your chart of accounts should have. For example, you can have 1st segment as Cost Center, 2nd as Activity and so on. You can also specify the length of the segment. Here you also specify that this segment is mandatory or not during a transaction.

2. Use "GL Component Maintenance" action item in "Chart of Accounts" application to specify the values for the segments you have defined in previous step. e.g. values 100, 200, 300 etc for 1st segment Cost Center. A5, B5, C6 etc for 2nd Segment Activity.

3. Use main tab in "Chart of Accounts" application to combine these segments to form a GL account for an organization. e.g. 100-A5 for a particular activity within a particular cost center.

Here are the underlying tables GL accounts:
GLCONFIGURE: Structure of a GL account is defined here
GLCOMPONENTS: All the possible values of individual segments are specified here [ segments are referred to as GL orders in table]
CHARTOFACCOUNTS: All the valid combinations of segments\components [valid GL account ] are listed here

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Closing a Work Order That is Waiting for Materials

If you try closing a Work Order which is waiting for materials, MAXIMO shall display a warning message. If you close the work order and try receiving the direst issue material against the PO, MAXIMO will not allow you to do so.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Reorder Process for Work Orders Waiting for Materials

If a Work Order is waiting for materials, i.e. the status is WMATL, then you need to run the reorder items process (can also be auto scheduled using cron task). This process checks all the Work Orders which are in WMATL status, and then creates the PRs for those items, keeping WO number as a reference in the PR. The "Issue on receipt" checkbox is also checked by MAXIMO for this process. User needs to convert those PRs into POs and then receive the material against these POs. The PO also has the work order reference number (copied from PR) and also "Issue on receipt" check box checked.  When you receive the material, based on "Issue on receipt" and work order reference, MAXIMO issues the material to Work Order.



Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Direct Issue Items

If you have mentioned a direct issue item (material) in plans tab of the Work Order, and when you approve the Work Order, the work order status changes to WMATL (not APPR). i.e the work order is waiting for material to arrive. Once you have received the material, the work order status changes automatically to APPR.

NOTE: Direct Issue items are items which you want to purchase and to be directly delivered to your work location instead of passing through the storeroom.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Movement of an Asset Between Operating Location and Storerooms

If you want to move an asset from one operating location to another operating location/storeroom, you can do so by using Move/Modify Assets action item available in Asset and Work Order applications. You cannot use this action item, if you want to move an asset from a storeroom location to an operation location because moving out an asset from storeroom is an inventory transactions, hence you should use issue item functionality available in Inventory Usage application. You can also use Inventory Usage application if you want to move an asset from one storeroom location to another storeroom location.



Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Calculation of the Next Due Date in a PM

The Next Due Date in a PM Schedule is the date on which you need to start executing the PM WO. If you select the checkbox “Use Last Work Order's Start Date to Calculate Next Due Date” the Next Due Date for a PM is calculated by MAXIMO based on frequency and first start date, and is a read-only field. If you want to postpone or pre-pone a certain PM task because of any reason, you can do so by entering the new date in the extended date field. In this case, MAXIMO will ignore the date in the Next Due Date field and will consider the value in Extended Date field as Next Due Date. After MAXIMO creates the WO based on Extended Date, the extended date field will become clear and next due date will be populated based on the frequency.
Similarly if the checkbox “Use Last Work Order's Start Date to Calculate Next Due Date” is unchecked the completion date of the last PM work order is used to calculate the next due date.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

How maximo creates Work plan from Job plan

If you specify a task in a Plan tab of Work Order or attach a Job Plan to a Work Order, MAXIMO shall automatically create Work Orders for all the tasks mentioned in the Job Plan or task in Work Plan. These Work Orders are called Task Work orders and are exactly same as the regular work order. These Work Orders shall be the Child Work Orders for the Work Order to which you are attaching the task or Job Plan. You can further attach some more tasks/Job Plans to these child Work Orders and MAXIMO shall again create the child work orders for these tasks/Job plan; thus building an unlimited (ideally) WO hierarchy (Parent -Child relationship).

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Asset creation and inventory update while receiving of a rotating item

If you raise a purchase order for an item which is rotating, then during receipt process of that PO, MAXIMO will ask you to enter the individual (new) asset number also so that the PO receipt process will increase the inventory and will create those many asset as well in the storeroom location; thus keeping the total count of asset equal to inventory on-hand quantity.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Continued..Difference between asset, rotating asset, sub assembly and spare part

As you make an item as rotating and then attach that item to an asset; thus making asset rotating.
If you want to adjust the current balance of an item (spare parts), you can do so by using the Action Item "Inventory Adjustment>> Current Balance". If you try using this Action Item for a rotating item, MAXIMO would not allow you to do so, because if an item is rotating, then you may also have the asset attached to it; thus making asset count not matching with the current balance of the item.

Whenever, you add or delete a rotating asset, MAXIMO automatically increases or decreases the current balance of that item (attached to asset).

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Difference between asset, rotating asset, sub assembly and spare part

Sometimes for an EAM beginner, it becomes difficult to differentiate among asset, rotating asset, sub assembly and spare part. Hence some tips.
Asset - A piece of hardware which resides in a location. You do maintenance on this. Carries an individual number.

Sub Assembly - Component of a piece of asset, each one of which has it's own asset number. Actually a child asset.

Spare Parts - Replaceable, disposable, repair parts. Not tracked as asset but tracked as Inventory. Tracked by quantity.

Ask following simple questions to yourself before deciding on spare parts or assets:

- Are they asset sub-assemblies?

- Do they have their own asset number?

- Do you want to track maintenance on each of them?

- Are extras stored in inventory?

If the answers are "Yes', they are subassemblies (Actually an asset). Then create individual asset numbers for them.

If "No", they are spare parts. Then, create inventory item numbers for them and associate them with asset as spare parts.
Rotating Asset - An asset which has item number also. Confused!!!!! Let us assume, you have an asset, which you want to send to vendor for repair. As per the standard business practice, you will send the asset to vendor through your storeroom (inventory). In order to have the asset tracked in storeroom (inventory), you need to have an item number also. Hence create an item number, specify it as "Rotating" (Item Master property). Attach this item number to the asset. Your asset becomes rotating.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Seasonal PM

A seasonal PM is a PM in which you can specify the active season to specify the period to execute work you do only during certain seasons. You can specify a Start Month & Day and End Month & Day so that PM schedule will generate the work order only between Start (month and day) and End (Month and day).

For Example, for a particular maintenance work the frequency is 1 month. But at the same time, you do not want to trigger any WO from PM schedule between 15 Jan and 15 Mar because of some peak season production. Then you can specify the active season in PM schedule as Starting at 16 Mar and Ending at 14 Jan.



Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Reorder Point and Reorder Quantity Calculation

MAXIMO reorders the quantity for an item whenever the current balance is less than or equal to the reorder point (ROP). The quantity to be ordered is calculated as follows:
Round the difference of ROP and Current balance to the nearest multiple of EOQ.



Example:

Assume Reorder Point = 30, Current Balance = 8, Economic Order Quantity =10.

Difference of ROP and current balance becomes 30 - 8 =22.

MAXIMO rounds the difference (22) up to 30, which is the nearest multiple of the order quantity (10). This is the quantity, MAXIMO suggests you for reordering. You can override it.

When the current balance is not less than the reorder point, and Ignore Reorder Point is checked, then EOQ becomes the suggested reorder quantity. 

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Usage of Work Order, Quick Reporting and Labor Reporting applications

Work Order, Quick Reporting and Labor Reporting applications refers to the same database table workorder. The difference lies in the data accessibility needs for intended users of these applications.

Work Order: Used to create a WO, plan labor, material, service and tools to execute it. Scheduling of the WO can also be done here and finally reporting the actuals.

Quick Reporting: Used to directly create ad-hoc WOs and report actuals for it. The need for such WOs might be due to a closed WO that has not actually been worked on, or some activity not planned on it and so issue not actually resolved. It is also leveraged when due to time constraint planning and scheduling of a WO is skipped.

Labor Reporting: This application has been provided specifically for labors\supervisors to report actual on WOs.

In continuation with the multisite and multiorganization strategy

IBM suggests having a single MAXIMO database for one company. That database can have multiple organizations and those organizations can have multiple sites.

·         Chart of Accounts, Base Currency, Taxes, Calendar, Tools, Vendors, Items, Crafts, Labor and Purchase Agreement are defined at organization level.

·         All Work Management data like Asset, Locations, Work Orders, Work Requests, Quick Reporting, Job Plans, Safety Plans, PM, Condition Monitoring, Failure Codes, Routes are defined at site level. Inventory features like storeroom, reorder, safety stock, issues and transfers, PRs, RFQs, POs, Invoices are at site level.

Multisite setup can be accessed using Administration module.

Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team

Multisite and MultiOrganization Strategy in MAXIMO

A Multisite implementation of MAXIMO enables different company plants to share data from a single database. In this case, multiple sites access the same shared database, while operating under independent business rules. It allows different sites to share Purchase Agreements and Vendors, while keeping work orders and job plan data separate, within an organization. All the sites need to be defined within an organization. An organization is a major division of a company. By using multisite setup, you can organize your company's plants into organizations and sites.

For example, consider the case of Reliance Industries. They have Power generation companies, Refineries and Chemicals business, within reliance umbrella.  They can define all the power generation companies as one organization (POWER), all the chemical production plans as another organization (CHEMICAL) and refineries as third organization (REFINERY); thus having three organizations within a single shared MAXIMO database. Each organization can further be divided into multiple sites (For three chemical production plants, three different sites within CHEMICAL organization) to have the similar kind of business rules for chemical industry. Some business elements/rules reside at the database level, some at organization and some at site level.



Courtesy: An old compilation from Infy Team