Categories Of Maintenance In A Hotel: Importance, Guidelines, Benefits (essay).

Outline & explain the various categories of Maintenance that is undertaken in the Hotel, with clear examples to differentiate each of them, and draw your conclusions on how is it beneficial to the establishment.

With an example for anyone of your choice of equipment used in the hotel, outline a Preventive Maintenance Instruction & Inspection guideline & their Schedule of maintenance.

In your understanding, how does preventive maintenance contribute to the productive use of labor (employees) and any other costs (dollars) associated with it. Discuss 

Categories of Maintenance in a Hotel

The hotel industry has been one of the fastest growing industries in the recent decades, and hence, maintenance has been a key factor to ensure that the operations of the hotels continue without hindrances (Chan, Lee & Burnett, 2011). It is a crucial factor to ensure that guests do not get the scope to complain on any aspect about the functioning and the quality of service that a hotel provides, thus enhancing the brand image of the hotel (Sigwau & Enz, 2013). This report will be focusing on the maintenance department of a hotel and attempt at assessing the various maintenance departments and their importance to the establishment. In order to serve that purpose, the discussion in this report will be focusing on the key questions. These questions include what the key categories of maintenance in a hotel are, their significance to the hotels, how preventive maintenance of a regular equipment should be outlined, and how preventive maintenance contributes to the productive use of labor and other costs associated with it. It would be also discussing about outsourcing of facilities management tasks, and how some job roles of the facilities manager remain the same even after outsourcing.

Categories of Maintenance in Hotels

The various categories of maintenance in a hotel involves:

• Preventive Maintenance
• Routine Maintenance
• Scheduled Maintenance
• Emergency and Breakdown Maintenance

In the first type of maintenance, focus is given on maintaining equipment that are in regular use for the proper provision of service by the hotel. The principle is that the particular equipment are of utmost importance, and hence, must be monitored and maintained regularly so that they do not breakdown and cause a situation of operational crisis in the hotel (Cesarotti & Spada, 2018). For example, it is important to regularly monitor and maintain the smoke alarm, which is used almost on a daily basis to detect smoke. If not maintained well enough, it could suffer a breakdown, which could be disastrous for the establishment during an unfortunate event.

Routine maintenance is a category of maintenance in which some routinely specific maintenance tasks are undertaken which are dedicated towards the upkeep of the property (Chan, Lee & Burnett, 2013). These maintenance activities are carried out on a regular basis and no formal order from the operational authority is required to initiate these maintenance activities, indicating that these are mandatory maintenance activities. The activities include general maintenance tasks without which a hotel would lose out on basic features such as the cleanliness and aesthetic appeal of it.  For example, generally every hotel undergoes lawn-mowing about once a week, to ensure that the length and amount of grass is acceptable for the guests and the lawn does not look clumsy or unhygienic. 

Scheduled maintenance tasks are those maintenance tasks which are carried out on a formal order, on specific schedules, to check the functioning and efficiency of particular equipment. The order of these maintenance tasks specifies problems and needs to be addressed, and has to be carried out in the property following a scheduled manner (Paraskevas, 2017). Sometimes, these are in some way a form of preventive maintenance. For example, checking oil levels in a vehicle or a machine to ensure that it does not run out of oil while in function.

The emergency and breakdown form of maintenance looks after maintaining equipment that are not of critical importance for the upkeep of the property. However, the principle behind this form of maintenance is that these equipment might be required on some occasions in the future, and hence, restoring or maintaining them is important as a preventive measure. For example, refilling the fire extinguisher or lubricating the emergency doors from time to time.

Establishment’s Benefits

The categories of maintenance discussed above are of critical value to the hotel in many ways. For example, preventive maintenance ensures that equipment which are required on a daily or a frequent basis do not malfunction. This ensures that the establishment does not come to a standstill as far as housekeeping is concerned, when an important equipment like a box sweeper malfunctions. Maintaining the equipment to prevent a possible breakdown of them, not only lets the establishment provide a quality housekeeping service, but also helps it in customer retention and satisfaction arising out of the brand image.

Routine maintenance helps an establishment create and maintain the aesthetic and visual appeal of an establishment, which increases can increase both brand value and brand image of the establishment, and attract more guests and satisfy them with the ambience of the hotel, since it is the most important aspect which any hotel would look for. On the other hand, scheduled maintenance activities ensure that the hotel does not fall in a situation of crisis or emergency with one of its equipment when it is most required, and also ensure that its maintenance activities are undertaken and completed on time and does not disrupt the schedule of the housekeeping department. Emergency and breakdown maintenance ensures that the establishment can make use of certain equipment which are rarely used, in emergency situations, so as to effectively use alternative ways or handle crisis situations when required. Failing to do this would otherwise lead to a chaos in the property. 

How Preventive Maintenance Contributes to Productive Use of Labor and Associated Costs

Preventive Maintenance of an Equipment

The equipment to be referred to in this section of the report, is a ‘Smoke alarm.’

The above picture is of a smoke alarm. This machine is used for alerting people in case of smoke of any form being detected by its sensors, to ensure that quick action is taken against the spread of fire inside a premise (Nakajima, 2015).

 Preventive Maintenance Instructiona

• Regular brooming of the smoke alarm.
• Vacuum cleaning around the vents of the detector to ensure that dust particles do not get accumulated.
• Spraying insect sprays around the surface of the smoke alarm, in a way that the spray does not come in contact with the sensors.
• Replacing the batteries regularly.

Inspection Guidelines

• It must be regularly checked that the sensor is clean.
• The sensors should be checked by pressing the test button.
• Battery levels must be checked on a regular basis.

Preventive Maintenance Schedule

Benefits of Preventive Maintenance in Productive Labor Use and Costs

Preventive maintenance ensures that labors do not get caught up in their duties due to breakdown of equipment. Since most of these equipment require manual handling, the smooth and productive functioning of the equipment will automatically ensure smooth and productive use of labor as well. In other words, if a labor is working with a fully and efficiently functioning equipment, his work would be much more productive and less time consuming than if he were to work with an ill maintained machine. The principle here is that properly functioning machines reduce the effort required manually to get a work done. Hence, labors can use lesser effort for a work if he is working with a fully efficient machine.

In terms of cost, it should be noted that maintenance of equipment to ensure that they do not malfunction incurs some cost to the establishment. However, it saves the establishment from incurring higher costs (Chan, 2018) in the event of breakdown of a machine due to poor preventive maintenance. For example, if the equipment breaks down, the cost of repairing could be higher than the maintenance cost of the equipment. If worse, the establishment might even have to purchase a new equipment, which would be even higher (Johanson & Nilsson, 2014). Apart from monetary costs, preventive maintenance also recues the establishment from incurring costs like poor customer satisfaction, operational standstills in housekeeping, and a drop in brand image (Dagger, David & Ng, 2013). This is the reason why preventive maintenance is of so much importance in the hotel industry.

Outsourcing in Facilities Management (Circumstances) (Q2)

There are various circumstances under which a facilities manager might want to outsource a particular facilities management task to an external contractor. These circumstances are to be discussed in the following paragraphs.

Firstly, outsourcing a service can be  cheaper than what is needed to be paid to internal employees for getting the same work done (Usher, 2013). There could be some instances where the general manager would order the facilities manager to get a particular task outsourced since it would be best for the economy of the establishment. This generally happens when the establishment in need to save its finances for various reasons. At that time, it is important that a facilities manager outsources a particular task to an outside contractor, who would be able to professionally get the task done for the establishment. This would in turn help the establishment in terms of cost effectiveness, arising out of procedure and labor optimization (Drion, Melissen & Wood, 2012). 

Outsourcing of Facilities Management Tasks

Secondly, the services of an external contractor would be highly time efficient, as they are professionals in those tasks, and earn their business from it. At times, it could be observed that the internal employees of the establishment are struggling hard to cope up with the tight schedule. In those times, the facilities manager might want to outsource the tasks to an external contractor. This would improve the timeliness of the task which is required to be done.

A facilities manager might also want to outsource a task if he thinks that a particular task or a set of tasks is not meeting the requirement in terms of quality within the establishment. Quality is of foremost importance for a facilities manager, and if he thinks that the quality which is being met by the internal employees is not upto the hotel standards, he could well consider outsourcing it to external contractors, once again because they are highly skilled professionals earning their business from it.

Another circumstance is flexibility (Hui & Tsang, 2014). An organization is ever changing in accordance to the dynamic market needs and demands of the clients. Hence, there could be a lot of different approaches which the establishment would need to consider adopting, in order to meet those needs. These changes may not be well adapted to by the internal employees of the establishment. Therefore, the organization might be suddenly finding themselves under the threat of lacking the necessary skills required to cope up with the rising dynamism within the facilities department. As a result, the facilities manager would be left with no other option than to outsource the task to an external contractor, pertaining to the perfect skills which the staffs of those contractors possess in these services.

Responsibilities of Facilities Manager After Outsourcing

Numerous responsibilities remain with the facilities manager even after outsourcing facilities management tasks. Perhaps, his responsibilities increase after the same (Harland et al., 2015). Some of the key responsibilities of the facilities manager after he outsources a particular task, are discussed in the following paragraphs.

Firstly, the facilities manager is required to keep a schedule and update it according to the requirement of the establishment, and timely hand them over to the contractors. These contractors are required to follow this schedule and serve the hotel accordingly. This is a responsibility which the facilities manager retains. Scheduling is a vital part which the facilities manager needs to be more responsible about after outsourcing. This is because getting the objectives communicated to an external contractor is much critical and tougher than getting them conveyed to the internal employees (Shah, 2018).

Conclusion

The facilities manager is also required to conduct and demonstrate the management tasks which the external employees would be taking under, in the same way as demonstrating them to the internal employees. Proper instructions from him on how to get a job done properly and in accordance to the standards of the establishment is a crucial thing to ensure that the outsourcing of the tasks proves to be effective and this is the responsibility of the facilties manager.

Even after outsourcing a task, a facilities manager still requires to maintain the coordination and notification of the external staffs that work under him. It is important for him to ensure that they stay informed about the latest developments in the plans and implementations within the department, and keep notifying them about urgencies when they arise. The facilities manager retains this responsibility from the time while working with the internal employees of the company. He must continue formulating the communication plans within the department, and ensure that communication takes place effectively. 

Last but not the least, a facilities manager also requires to look after the work and the progress of the tasks which have been taken over by the external contractors. The job still remains the same for the facilities manager as when working with the internal employees of the organization. He must check that every task is going according to plan and is indeed meeting the standards of the establishment.

Conclusion

From the above discussion, it can be deducted that maintenance is of utmost importance for a hotel, to ensure that it functions flawlessly. If not looked after properly, poor maintenance can lead to significant consequences. It comes in various categories, namely preventive, emergency and breakdown, scheduled and routine maintenance. Each of these are equally important to upkeep the property in terms of both aesthetic and service values (Peters, 2017). The report particularly focuses on preventive maintenance and its importance, and the ways in which a particular equipment can be taken care of via preventive maintenance, which in this report, referred to a smoke alarm. Inspection on the regular condition of the machine must be done to keep a track of its condition. Preventive maintenance not only benefits the establishment in terms of productive use of labor, but also in terms of costs. There are also some instances where a facilities manager might have to consider outsourcing specific tasks to external contractors. However, his job roles even after outsourcing them remain more or less the same. 

References

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