Safety

Forklift Safety Day 2021, What You Can Do to Celebrate

Barry Company News, Material Handling News, Regulatory, Safety , , , , ,

The Industrial Truck Association has announced Forklift Safety Day, to be held Tuesday, June 8. While most of us won’t be able to attend the DC festivities as they are virtual due to Covid 19, there are things you can do to take advantage of this day to help create awareness about the dangers that forklifts present and how to minimize the potential for accidents that can result in injury or death, damage to your facility, equipment and financial losses.

We’ve compiled a short list of things you can do to improve safety on and around your forklifts, and create more attention to forklift safety.

Forklift Operator Training

Make sure all your forklift operators have been trained and that their refresher training is up to date, if applicable or necessary.

Free Forklift Safety Downloads

Pedestrian Training

Take some time to gather any staff that operates around forklifts, but not on them, to refresh them about the dangers of this equipment and how to be sure to use safe procedures when they are in an area of your facility where forklifts are being operated.

Forklift Maintenance

Make sure all your forklift’s maintenance is up to date. If you have a Planned Maintenance Agreement, this would be a good time to review it with your service provider to ensure all standard checkpoints as well as unique equipment attachments are being inspected and maintained properly.

Make sure you forklifts have proper safety equipment and that it’s operating properly. Lights, horns, back-up alarms, seat belts, fire extinguishers etc… 

Make sure you have lock-out kits to ensure that forklifts that do not pass an inspection are locked out immediately until repairs are made.

Learn more about our maintenance and service offerings

Site-Specific Review

Review any unique “site specific” features your facility may have and be sure your operators are aware of proper handling of equipment while on or around these features (ramps, areas where floors can be slick, floor substrates that vary etc…)

Forklift Operator Training

Make sure that training is part of your company’s orientation for anyone that will or MIGHT operate a forklift. Remember, employees that have not been properly trained aren’t even allowed to sit on and start a forklift, much less move it out of the way of anything.

Forklift Fleet Analysis

Review all your forklifts for possible replacement. Old forklifts, or those that are getting “up there” in hours, might be potential threats. Review safety records and maintenance logs for your equipment. You might find this could be a good time to replace some or even all of your forklifts.-

Our goal is to help you operate safe, efficient and productive forklift equipment. To discuss forklift safety, operator training – or to get a quote on new equipment, please contact us at 800-322-5438.

Tips to Improve Pedestrian Safety in Your Warehouse

Barry Safety

When it comes to forklift safety, a lot of emphasis is placed upon safe forklift operation; as it should be. What we see quite frequently, though, is a lack of training for employees working in a warehouse situation but who do not operate forklifts but merely work around them all day, every day. Working around them without knowledge pertaining to their potential hazards creates a dangerous scenario for catastrophe.

We recommend formal forklift operator classroom training for all of your facility employees who could encounter a forklift in the course of their responsibilities. This training should cover the following:

How forklifts and similar equipment operate: While operator training is not required, it is nevertheless important for employees to know the limitations of forklifts and their operators in a warehouse setting.

  • Visibility: The operator’s vision is severely limited, especially when carrying a load. There are many other pitfalls of assuming that the operator is aware of the employee’s presence.
  • Eye contact: Employees should try to make eye contact with an operator. This ensures that the operator is fully aware of the employee’s presence. Busy operators may or may not be aware of the pedestrian, and any sudden move could result in a collision.
  • Stopping: A 7,000-lb. forklift carrying a 5,000-lb. load cannot stop as quickly as a car, and if the operator slams on the brakes to avoid an employee, the employee could find 5,000 pounds of product hurtling in his direction.
  • Keeping your distance: Never approach a forklift from the rear. Keep beyond three feet of the side, and never stand in front of a forklift or on the forks. This keeps the pedestrian safe should any sudden movement of the forklift occur.
  • Forklifts cannot be heard: Electric forklifts are completely silent, and even internal combustion units can approach without being heard in a busy, noisy facility. Be certain that all pedestrians understand this and are diligently LOOKING for lift trucks and equipment at all times, particularly at intersections.

The potential dangers of working around this equipment: Rear ends swing wide, loads can spill, toes can be run over, and many other dangers exist if the employee is not cognizant of how to behave around a forklift. Lift trucks present a number of dangers. The operators are aware of these hazards, but pedestrians often consider forklifts benign pieces of equipment.

  • Falling loads: When walking near a lift truck depositing or retrieving a load at various heights, a pedestrian should know that loads can tumble down. The pedestrian should avoid the area at all costs.
  • Wide swings: The rear of the forklift can swing quickly to one side or the other, resulting in collision with a pedestrian or running over feet.
  • Weight: People rarely understand that forklifts are very heavy machines that cannot stop quickly. A collision often results in serious injury and sometimes death. Pedestrians need to understand this and respect the potential dangers.
  • Proper use: Pedestrians should know that they are not allowed to operate this equipment without proper training, even if it is to hop on a quickly moving lift truck to find the product they are seeking.
  • Reporting: Any unsafe conditions should be reported by pedestrians immediately to a supervisor. These include unsafe operation or conditions in the facility that create a potential for accident.

What you can do to minimize these potential dangers: As a manager or supervisor, you must ensure that each person entering your facility, whether he is another employee or a guest, understands these potential hazards and is alert for them when in your facility.

  • Training and briefing: Training pedestrians or employees who regularly enter your facility should be a requirement, whether the person is an employee, vendor, or other guest who is a regular visitor. If you have an occasional visitor, this guest should be briefed on what type of equipment you operate, how it operates, your safety procedures, and the need to be alert at all times.
  • Install lanes and pedestrian islands: Simple pedestrian lanes painted on the floor and training on how to use them are the ultimate scenario to protect pedestrians. Having protected islands for pedestrians to pack or perform other duties keeps them safe when working among forklifts.
  • Lighting: Provide adequate lighting in aisles and other areas to ensure maximum visibility.
  • Set speed limits: Finding the balance between maximizing productivity and creating a safe environment for employees is key. Aisle speeds and intersection speeds will vary and are different for each facility.
  • Install mirrors at intersections: Then, train employees and operators alike to use them to see what’s coming around the corner.
  • Ensure that all safety devices on all of your lift trucks are operational: Items like back-up alarms, horns, and lights should be checked daily to ensure operational effectiveness.

It takes only a few seconds of inattentiveness for an accident to occur. Training, informing, and monitoring produce a safe work environment and minimize your bottom line exposure, should an accident occur.

Safety is no accident, and if we can be of any service to you in creating a safe work environment, we are here to help.

Learn more about Cal-Lift.

4 Tips to Improve Dock Safety

Barry Material Handling Equipment, Safety, Uncategorized
Improving safety on a warehouse dock is crucial for preventing accidents and maintaining a secure work environment. Here are some recommendations to enhance safety:
  1. Conduct regular safety training: Train all dock workers on proper safety protocols, including equipment operation, handling hazardous materials, and emergency procedures. Offer refresher courses periodically and ensure everyone understands safety regulations.
  2. Provide personal protective equipment (PPE): Supply all workers with appropriate PPE, such as hard hats, safety glasses, high-visibility vests, steel-toed boots, and gloves. Encourage their consistent use and enforce PPE policies.
  3. Maintain clear communication: Establish effective communication systems, such as two-way radios or intercoms, to allow clear communication between dock workers, truck drivers, and supervisors. Ensure everyone can effectively relay information, warnings, and instructions.
  4. Implement traffic management: Develop a comprehensive traffic management plan for the dock area to prevent collisions and improve pedestrian safety. Clearly mark pedestrian walkways and separate them from vehicle lanes. Install signage and mirrors to enhance visibility, and consider using barriers or guardrails where necessary.
  5. Ensure proper lighting: Adequate lighting is essential for a safe dock environment. Install sufficient lighting fixtures to eliminate dark areas and shadows that could obscure visibility. Regularly inspect and maintain lighting systems to address any issues promptly.
  6. Regular maintenance of equipment: Establish a planned maintenance program for all dock equipment, including forklifts, loading ramps, and conveyor systems. Regular inspections and maintenance help identify potential hazards, preventing equipment malfunctions that could lead to accidents.
  7. Promote good housekeeping: Encourage a clean and organized work environment. Ensure that walkways, ramps, and loading areas are free of clutter, debris, spills, and obstacles that can cause slips, trips, or falls. Provide adequate waste management systems to prevent accumulation of waste materials.
  8. Implement safety barriers and guards: Install safety barriers, guardrails, and bollards to protect pedestrians and prevent unauthorized access to restricted areas. Implement dock edge protection systems to prevent accidental falls from the dock.
  9. Use warning signs and labels: Clearly display warning signs and labels to communicate potential hazards, such as restricted areas, low clearance, slippery surfaces, or areas with moving equipment. Ensure signage is prominently visible and easily understood.
  10. Regular safety inspections: Conduct routine safety inspections to identify potential hazards, non-compliance with safety protocols, or equipment issues. Encourage reporting of safety concerns by workers and promptly address any identified problems.
  11. Emergency preparedness: Develop and communicate emergency procedures specific to the dock area. Clearly mark emergency exits, fire extinguishers, and other safety equipment. Conduct drills periodically to ensure workers are familiar with emergency protocols.
  12. Encourage employee involvement: Involve employees in safety initiatives by establishing a safety committee or encouraging their participation in safety discussions. Encourage workers to report safety concerns, near-miss incidents, or potential hazards, and reward proactive safety behavior.

Partnering with a professional material handling company gives you insight from industry professionals whose goal is to help you create a safe working environment for anyone that operates in or around your docks.

We’re Southern California’s source for material handling equipment, service, parts and rentals. Give us a call at 800-322-LIFT.

Who Created OSHA, Why, and the Outcomes

Barry Regulatory, Safety, Uncategorized , , , , ,

OSHA-Logo-300x298Recently, we shared some information about the effects forty years of OSHA has had on industries. This led to a conversation about the real intents, effects and outcomes of OSHA on the American worker. We thought we would share some of the content of those discussions with you in order to bring a renewed perspective about the agency and what they do every day to ensure people like you, me and our children can go to work and be relatively confident that they will be protected from hazards seen, and sometimes unseen, in their workplace.

To understand any company’s operating philosophy, you must understand their mission. Congress created OSHA to assure safe and healthful conditions for working men and women by setting and enforcing standards and providing training, outreach, education, and compliance assistance.

We won’t belabor a long study of history. But OSHA formed for a reason. While many companies, past and present, do their best to ensure the safety of their employees, there also were, and still are, many that do not place worker safety in high regard. Given that one of the roles of government is to “promote the general welfare” of its citizens, something needed to be done to ensure that all companies were doing the “right thing” when it came to the safety and welfare of their workforce. With that purpose in mind, OSHA was formed and signed into law by President Richard Nixon under the Occupational Health and Safety Act of 1971.

When OSHA establishes a new regulation, it seeks and receives a tremendous amount of input from the public via RFIs (Requests for Information) and announcements that a new regulation is pending. They consult both large and small businesses to ensure the regulation will not put undue burdens on small businesses and cause them to suffer financially or potentially close. The bottom line is that OSHA has a systematic process to try to balance the need for safety and health with the productivity of business.

Within our industry, OSHA provides educational tools like the Powered Industrial Truck eTool to help businesses understand the dangers of lift trucks and how to ensure that each father, mother, sister and brother who operates one gets home safely each night. This site is packed full of information for the sole purpose of seeing that each person who operates a lift truck knows the dangers of the equipment and has guidance on how to operate it safely within the parameters of their work environment.

The outcome cannot be debated. Since its inception, workplace fatalities and occupational injuries have dropped by 60%. In fact, in 1971, when OSHA was signed into law, workplace fatalities numbered about 14,000 per year. In 2009, even though the American workforce has doubled in size, the number of American deaths due to workplace injury had dropped to 4,400. OSHA has helped businesses accomplish this by creating best practices for any given job, sharing them with other companies through its education process, and enforcing them through inspections.

We perform a tremendous amount of forklift operator training to meet OSHA requirements. When we engage a customer in training, we encourage them not to approach it as simply another hoop government forces us to jump through. While yes, we do recognize that it does place a burden on a business, and there’s no doubt that there have been times when OSHA has not gotten it completely right, we believe OSHA brings value to every American in the workplace.

We have found that companies that provide comprehensive training programs have higher levels of employee satisfaction, leading to better productivity, better care for the equipment they operate, fewer accidents and injuries, and a healthier bottom line for the company. Now that’s a by-product of OSHA we can all live with! Visit our website to learn more about Cal-Lift, Inc., Southern California’s source for material handling equipment, service, parts and rentals.

www.cal-lift.com

Four Traits of Safety Minded Companies

Barry Material Handling Management, Productivity, Safety , , , ,
When companies are safety-minded these are four things that almost all of them do proactively to ensure a safe operation.
As managers and owners, we want a safe work environment for all of our employees. Unfortunately, all too often it escapes us. Time passes quickly, and initiatives that were once important standards become guidelines or even merely suggestions. How can we ensure that when we put safety measures in place, they will stay in place as employees come and go in a business climate that is constantly in flux?While we lack the space to answer this question in full detail here, there are a few major approaches to providing a safe work environment that transcend industries, equipment and facilities. We outline these “hows and whys” of workplace safety below.

Since 1970, OSHA has worked to create a safer workplace for all employees, and their mission has been very successful. However, accidents still happen, and not only at companies willfully violating OSHA standards. Sometimes safety goes beyond meeting standards due to unique circumstances in certain operations.

The following are a few approaches to safety that have helped both large and small companies to achieve better workplace safety, fewer incidents and accidents, lower costs, more productivity and better workplace attitudes.

Safety is integrated with company mission – Safe companies put as much emphasis on doing things safely as on doing them productively. From day one, every employee knows they are working for a company that would rather they do their job safely than quickly. These employees will lockout a piece of equipment when something goes wrong, will replace light bulbs that need it instead of ignoring them and will report unsafe behavior or unsafe conditions.

Training never ends – Employees are involved in ongoing training – how to lift more safely, how to sit properly in a chair, how to operate a certain piece of equipment and so on. Your business is fluid: things change; equipment changes; and equipment, building space and employees are added. As your conditions change, your training must address these changes. Training for the safest work environments is never a one-time event or a two- or three-day training initiation. It is an ongoing pursuit of the safest possible work facility. It should be a goal of all employees to see that their coworkers go home safe every night.

Involvement at all levels – While involvement in a safe work environment must start from the corner office, the mission and strategy it is also important to ensure that every employee knows that they are involved and responsible. It is a good idea to create safety teams for every facet of your business, to revolve people in and out of those teams, and to have them conduct frequent facility or department reviews to identify potential threats. The most successful companies have reward systems for reporting anything that could be a potential threat, even if it is as minor as a sharp corner on a coat rack. This keeps all employees engaged in creating a safe work environment.

Accountability – Once you have established your safety mission and mapped out your strategy, everyone involved must be held accountable. No one can shirk their safety responsibilities. If a sharp corner on a coat rack is missed and someone gets cut, find out why no one noticed. Are they doing regular inspections? If safety standards are not being met, it is the leadership’s job to find out why and fix it. Everyone must know that if an accident happens on their watch, it must be accounted for and a plan must be designed to ensure that it will not happen again.

A truly safe, productive and profitable workplace is attained through ongoing efforts, and these are just a few of the major traits of successful organizations. We encourage you to seek the assistance of OSHA, NIOSH or other private safety consultants to help you organize and strategize your safety plans.

If there is anything we can help you with in regard to your equipment and its operators, please contact us at 800-322-5438. We would be happy to assist you!

Planned Maintenance as Part of Your Safety Program

Barry Forklift Service, Safety, Uncategorized , , ,

CLARKMaintenance smallLike anything else in life, whether it’s your car, your home or even your body, planning and conducting preventive maintenance creates long-term benefits that are well worth the investment. Why would your forklift and other materials handling equipment be any different?

Having your forklifts regularly serviced reduces the likelihood of component failure, which improves the safety of not only your forklift fleet, but anyone that works around them.

There are many benefits of properly maintaining your forklift fleet and other equipment. However, we have recognized five major benefits that our customers have enjoyed.

Planned Maintenance has been proven to:

Lower Your Maintenance Costs – Proactive and preventive maintenance has proven to lower costs by catching small service issues before they blossom into giant repair headaches.

Improve Useful Equipment Life – Equipment that is serviced regularly does not have to be “turned over” as frequently. This lowers your equipment costs over time.

Increased Productivity – Equipment that is well maintained does not break down. This improves productivity as well as your bottom line performance.

Increase Residual Values – When you trade-in your equipment, or sell it to purchase new equipment, well maintained equipment has proven to have higher values than equipment serviced on an “as needed” basis.

Enhance Facility Safety – Equipment failures can have catastrophic consequences. Properly maintaining your equipment will improve operator safety, as well as those that work around your equipment.

Having the right partner in maintaining your equipment is as important as selecting the right doctor for the maintenance of your health. Our trained, experienced technicians perform thousands of Planned Maintenance service calls each year.

Get more information or a quote on a Planned Maintenance program for your material handling equipment.

The Flu, Its Cost and How to Avoid it

Barry Productivity, Safety, Uncategorized , , , , ,

FluEach flu season in America, between 5% and 20% of American’s contract the flu. This leads to 111 million lost productive work days, which costs American business approximately 7 billion dollars! In addition, the direct costs (doctor’s visits, medication, hospitalization) cost individuals over 4.5 billion dollars a year! Source: CDC Whether it’s in your accounting department or forklift operators, you want to limit an outbreak at your company and contain any outbreak that does occur.

The effects of lost productivity can have a great effect on your ability to deliver products and services and provide customer service, which can lead to a negative impact on your bottom line. But there are things you can do to lower the risk at the department level and facility level. It all starts with planning and communication.

  1. Developing a plan to combat influenza? Businesses plan for all sorts of calamities and naturally occurring disasters. Does your company have a preparedness plan to prevent a flu outbreak? A tremendous amount of information is available to help you plan for and combat an outbreak of the flu a http://www.flu.gov/planning-preparedness/business/
  2. Educate your employees and take steps to encourage vaccination.One study showed a decrease in over 71% in hospitalizations when a flu vaccination was administered to adults of all ages (source). Flu vaccines not only reduce the chances of contracting the flu, but it also reduces the effects of the flu if an employee contracts it, thus enabling them to get back to full productivity sooner.
  3. Use Resources.The CDC has a great Business Tool Kit to help you educate your employees about the flu, how to prevent it and what to do if you think you are coming down with it. Visit the CDC Business Tool Kit Webapge.
  4. Proper sanitary proceduresare also essential during the flu season. Placing hand sanitizers throughout your facility and encouraging if not outright requiring their use will help contain the spread of the virus, should an employee become infected. There are additional steps you can take to prevent the spread of the flu, including increasing janitorial services or assigning teams to assist in the sanitization of routinely used and shared points, such as water fountains, door knobs/handles, bathrooms, and kitchens.
  5. Send them home!If an employee starts to show the signs of influenza, it’s important to remove them from the facility as soon as possible and require that they remain home until symptoms have subsided, particularly a fever.
  6. Seek immediate attention. If you or anyone around starts to feel fatigue, loss of appetite, lethargy, fever or any of the other first signs of the flu, get to a doctor and ask about anti-viral drugs. These drugs can cut your misery in half, as well as your time off work, and productivity.

The effects of flu season can be dramatic if left unaddressed. But developing a plan to deal with the flu and spreading education before the flu spreads itself around your facility will help you maintain your business productivity during this flu season.

Our focus is frequently on productivity, and this is not always about equipment and processes. Sometimes peripheral components can have an impact on our bottom lines, and it is important to us to serve as your partner in addressing all facts of productivity. We encourage you to visit the flu.gov site to learn more.

CLARK Force-Cooled Wet Disc Brakes

Barry New Forklifts, Product Information, Safety , , , , , ,

The CLARK S-SERIES lift truck features Force-Cooled Wet Disc Brakes as standard equipment. The S-SERIES lift truck was designed with Force-Cooled Wet Disc Brakes to help the overall strength of the lift truck as well as to lower operator fatigue.

Learn more about the CLARK S-Series forklift at our website

Pedestrian Safety: 16 Things You Should Know

Barry Safety, Uncategorized , , , ,
When it comes to forklift safety, a lot of emphasis is placed upon safe forklift operation, as it should be. What we see quite frequently, though, is a lack of training for employees working in a warehouse situation but who do not operate forklifts but merely work around them all day, every day. Working around them without knowledge pertaining to their potential hazards creates a dangerous scenario for catastrophe.
We recommend formal classroom training for all of your facility employees who could encounter a forklift in the course of their responsibilities. This training should cover the following:
  • Visibility: The operator’s vision is severely limited, especially when carrying a load. There are many other pitfalls of assuming that the operator is aware of the employee’s presence.
  • Eye contact: Employees should try to make eye contact with an operator. This ensures that the operator is fully aware of the employee’s presence. Busy operators may or may not be aware of the pedestrian, and any sudden move could result in a collision.
  • Stopping: A 7,000-lb. forklift carrying a 5,000-lb. load can not stop as quickly as a car, and if the operator slams on the brakes to avoid an employee, the employee could find 5,000 pounds of product hurtling in his direction.
  • Keeping your distance: Never approach a forklift from the rear. Keep beyond three feet of the side, and never stand in front of a forklift or on the forks. This keeps the pedestrian safe should any sudden movement of the forklift occur.
  • Forklifts cannot be heard: Electric forklifts are completely silent, and even internal combustion units can approach without being heard in a busy, noisy facility. Be certain that all pedestrians understand this and are diligently LOOKING for lift trucks and equipment at all times, particularly at intersections.
The potential dangers of working around this equipment: Rear ends swing wide, loads can spill, toes can be run over, and many other dangers exist if the employee is not cognizant of how to behave around a forklift. Lift trucks present a number of dangers. The operators are aware of these hazards, but pedestrians often consider forklifts benign pieces of equipment.
  • Falling loads: When walking near a lift truck depositing or retrieving a load at various heights, a pedestrian should know that loads can tumble down. The pedestrian should avoid the area at all costs.
  • Wide swings: The rear of the forklift can swing quickly to one side or the other, resulting in collision with a pedestrian or running over feet.
  • Weight: People rarely understand that forklifts are very heavy machines that cannot stop quickly. A collision often results in serious injury and sometimes death. Pedestrians need to understand this and respect the potential dangers.
  • Proper use: Pedestrians should know that they are not allowed to operate this equipment without proper training, even if it is to hop on a quickly moving lift truck to find the product they are seeking.
  • Reporting: Any unsafe conditions should be reported by pedestrians immediately to a supervisor. These include unsafe operation or conditions in the facility that create a potential for accident.
What you can do to minimize these potential dangers: As a manager or supervisor, you must ensure that each person entering your facility, whether he is another employee or a guest, understands these potential hazards and is alert for them when in your facility.
  • Training and briefing: Training pedestrians or employees who regularly enter your facility should be a requirement, whether the person is an employee, vendor, or other guest who is a regular visitor. If you have an occasional visitor, this guest should be briefed on what type of equipment you operate, how it operates, your safety procedures, and the need to be alert at all times.
  • Install lanes and pedestrian islands: Simple pedestrian lanes painted on the floor and training on how to use them are the ultimate scenario to protect pedestrians. Having protected islands for pedestrians to pack or perform other duties keeps them safe when working among forklifts.
  • Lighting: Provide adequate lighting in aisles and other areas to ensure maximum visibility.
  • Set speed limits: Finding the balance between maximizing productivity and creating a safe environment for employees is key. Aisle speeds and intersection speeds will vary and are different for each facility.
  • Install mirrors at intersections: Then, train employees and operators alike to use them to see what’s coming around the corner.
  • Ensure that all safety devices on all of your lift trucks are operational: Items like back-up alarms, horns, and lights should be checked daily to ensure operational effectiveness.
It takes only a few seconds of inattentiveness for an accident to occur. Training, informing, and monitoring produce a safe work environment and minimize your bottom line exposure, should an accident occur.
Safety is no accident, and if we can be of any service to you in creating a safe work environment, we are here to help.

Tips to Lower Your Material Handling Costs

Barry Forklift Service, Productivity, Safety, Uncategorized , , , ,

Reducing your costs means increasing your profits and increasing your profits has never been more challenging than in recent years.  Our experience with hundreds of various types of operations, utilizing hundreds of pieces of equipment in more than a thousand ways, has exposed us to thousands of variations in facilities, equipment, and applications. In working with these diverse clients, we have recognized commonalities that, when implemented, resulted in lower total operating costs for materials handling most of the time. Following are five that we highly recommend:

Choose Application-Specific Equipment – In other words, “buy the right equipment for the job at hand.” We often see equipment being used in applications for which they were not designed. That results in accelerated wear, increased damage and ultimately, increased costs. Working with professionals who can survey your applications and recommend the right equipment for each job is one of the most important things you can do to decrease overall costs.  Using the proper equipment with the right specifications means efficient, productive results.

Planned Maintenance – Your fleet equipment works hard. And hard-working equipment needs proper maintenance.  Working with a professional and reputable fleet service provider that serves you at appropriate intervals is the key to catching small maintenance issues, before they become larger and much more expensive. In addition, well-maintained equipment operates more efficiently, experiences more up-time and results in improved operator morale.

Invest in a Robust Training Program – Operator safety training is required by OSHA, and a daily inspection of equipment is one of OSHA’s requirements. Most companies train their operators regarding safe operation, but more often than not, the training stops there. Clients that invest in training employees to perform daily inspections, and to know what to look for, see results. If you install a process for equipment that will eventually need repair, you can ensure that unsafe equipment stays off the operating floor, and small repairs can be handled before they blossom into colossal nightmares.

Work With Single-Source Dealerships When Possible – The more work you can assign to a qualified and reliable supplier, the fewer calls you have to make. In turn, the supplier becomes more familiar with your equipment, facility and applications. This leads to greater efficiencies for you. It also allows your supplier to better understand your operation and thus make logical suggestions that can reduce your costs, increase your efficiency and productivity, and ultimately improve your bottom line.

Fleet Management – Whether you do it yourself or assign responsibility to your materials handling partner, fleet management is a key part of knowing the useful economic lifespan of your equipment. And economic lifespan may vary by application within your operation. If you keep a finger on the pulse of your maintenance expenses and know when it’s time to trade in or re-lease, that process will more than pay for itself in the long run.

There are hundreds of other things you can do to minimize the total operating costs of your facility. We have addressed some of them in previous feature articles. We hope that you have found these Top Five useful.  If we can assist you further, or provide you with more information, please contact us at 888-322-LIFT.