When budgets are tight, equipment and infrastructure maintenance is often the first line item to be re-evaluated. However, this often results in higher costs down the road.
Here’s how trimming maintenance and housekeeping can add up—and our risk experts’ recommendations on the considerations that should be part of every maintenance program.
What does maintenance and housekeeping entail?
Maintenance involves the technical process of functional checks, servicing, and repairs required to keep infrastructure and supporting utilities in a functional state. When these activities are treated as deferrable, they convert into a high-interest liability.
Housekeeping extends beyond cleanliness to include:
- Keeping work areas neat and orderly
- Ensuring halls and floors are free of slip and trip hazards
- Removing waste materials (e.g., paper, cardboard) and other fire hazards from work areas
Good housekeeping is also a basic part of incident and fire prevention.
The compounding cost of deferring maintenance
The logic behind deferring maintenance often assumes that costs remain static. In reality, these expenses compound. A standard repair cost of $1,000 can grow to nearly $2,000 over a 10-year deferral period—effectively doubling the financial burden before accounting for emergency premiums or collateral system damage.
In an environment where capital budgets may contract, organizations are frequently forced to extend the service life of aging assets beyond their intended design, making consistent upkeep a requirement for reliability.
Operational vulnerabilities
A reactive fix-it-when-it-breaks strategy could introduce significant risks that a disciplined maintenance program is designed to mitigate, including:
- Supply chain disruptions: Economic stress often results in slower parts availability and higher replacement costs, making unexpected failures far more disruptive than planned servicing.
- Workforce consistency: Reductions in personnel can compromise the quality of routine checks, meaning minor issues are more likely to go unnoticed until they evolve into major failures.
- Avoidable catastrophes: Proactive programs prevent seasonal failures—such as heating systems failing in sub-zero temperatures—and help avoid incidents like fires or floods caused by neglected sprinkler systems.
Reliability in critical infrastructure
Aviva risk management experts advise maintaining proactive visibility into the high-risk assets that form the backbone of a facility. These include:
1. Emergency generators
Reliability depends on more than just having a unit on-site. Without correct maintenance, these units often fail to start or stop functioning shortly after coming online during a grid failure.
It’s important to exercise consistent oversight of battery health, air intakes, and enclosure integrity. And perform regular load tests and oil sample analysis to ensure operational readiness.
2. Boilers and chillers
These systems are highly sensitive to chemical and environmental factors.
- Boilers: Scale formation and corrosion driven by poor water chemistry reduce heat transfer efficiency and cause premature tube failures. Regular testing of Low Water Cut-Offs (LWCOs) and relief valves is necessary to prevent catastrophic damage.
- Chillers: Most failures stem from improper winterization or condenser tube damage. Maintain technical command over the winterization process to prevent seasonal breakage.
3. Electrical systems
Electrical failure can lead to severe safety hazards and costly downtime. It’s crucial to monitor for water intrusion in electrical rooms, which can cause rapid corrosion. And track for emerging signals of overheating by checking for dust and debris accumulation, loose connections, or worn insulation.
Housekeeping as an early warning system
Daily property walkthroughs, preferably performed first thing in the morning, are essential for identifying issues that may have occurred overnight. This is especially critical following extreme weather events. By documenting even minor remedial actions, teams can utilize trend analysis to identify recurring issues before they escalate into major operational disruptions.
The role of equipment breakdown insurance
Even the most sophisticated risk management strategies aren’t foolproof. That’s why it’s important to have specialized equipment breakdown insurance (EBI), particularly if your organization has elevated technical risk and dependency on critical infrastructure.
EBI provides comprehensive protection against losses arising from internal equipment failure—including mechanical breakdown, electrical arcing, centrifugal force, and pressure vessel rupture—covering both repair and replacement costs necessary to restore operational capability. EBI also extends coverage to consequential losses such as business interruption, production downtime, and associated loss of revenue, ensuring continuity of operations following a system critical breakdown event.
Ultimately, maintaining strong maintenance and housekeeping practices will secure organizational resilience. Prioritizing these programs will protect your asset longevity and minimize the risk of avoidable financial shocks.
