Shop Operations Flashcards
What is downtime and how does it affect operations?
When vehicles are needed but aren’t available, there is no value being generated to offset the cost of the investment.
What are several strategies to use when service demands increase?
• Lower Service Levels
• Add Capacity with a New/Expanded Facility
• Added Staff & Shifts
• Out-source/Out-task Supplementation
How can Fleet Information Management Systems improve service and dependability?
FIMS are work order based and has a coding scheme that identifies the work presented and reasoning.
Accurately coding work allows the cost and downtime for scheduled and unscheduled work to be tracked separately.
What is the difference between Preventive and Predictive Maintenance?
Preventive Maintenance: services/checks scheduled based on measurable intervals.
Predictive Maintenance: replaces parts before their usable life is complete to prevent failure at an inopportune time and location.
When should the decision to perform a function in-house or out-source be made?
To increase the capabilities of the internal operations or to supplement it to smooth out irregular demand.
What factors might influence the decision to out-source a function?
- depends on who can do the job for the lowest cost, highest quality, and/or quickest.
- specialty work should usually be outsourced because the vendor can probably beat the shop on cost, quality and speed.
How can technician productivity be measured?
- Establishing ‘Book times’ for light-duty vehicles are readily available in various guidebooks.
- Job times for medium- and heavy-duty chassis are also increasingly available from these sources.
- Job times for truck bodies, ancillary equipment, specialty vehicles, and off-road equipment are more difficult to determine.
How to construct a flow chart and why is it important?
- Define the process and identify the scope of the flow diagram.
- Identify project team members involved in the construction.
- Define the different steps involved in the process and the interrelationships between the different steps.
- Finalize the diagram, involving other concerned individuals as needed and making any modifications necessary.
- Use the flow diagram and continuously update it as needed.
How to design and use a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP)?
- The organization should have a procedure for determining how procedures or processes need to be documented.
- SOPs should be written by subject matter experts.
- SOPs should be written in a concise, step-by-step, easy-to-read format.
- Sufficient detail that someone can reproduce the procedure unsupervised.
How are labor rates constructed?
- Include billable employee’s salary, benefits and other overhead costs.
- Costs incurred from other agencies (insurance, FIMS, legal etc).
- Vary by general vehicle classes.
- Reviewed annually and adjust.
What is the Cost Allocation Spectrum?
Differentiates between knowing costs, allocating costs and billing for costs.
Position A - organizations do not track the costs of fleet operations.
Position B - fleets know the majority of their costs.
Position C - fleets know their costs and allocate them to customers
Position D - fleets know and allocate operating costs and bill customers.
Position E - fleet departments know, allocate and bill for the majority of operating and capital costs.
Position F - fleets have a comprehensive system that tracks even incidental and all overhead costs.
What are the three fund structures?
General fund – annual budget allocation to cover fleet costs. No recovery made from customers.
Internal service fund – to account for the financing of goods and services provided by one department to another.
Enterprise fund – used to account for revenues received for goods and services provided to users on a continuing basis and financed through user charges.
