Outsourcing Maintenance: The Advantages of Contracting Out

Experienced facility and building managers are aware of the importance of a regular maintenance schedule: These plans reduce costs and increase safety while optimizing workflow and productivity. Regardless of whether the facilities are large enterprises – such as hotels or hospitals – or smaller businesses, there are unique advantages to a regular maintenance schedule when they outsource this to a reliable business partner.

Thanks to outsourcing, smaller companies that do not have the resources to hire multiple full-time technicians do not have to forgo the expertise of highly specialized service technicians.

Likewise, even if larger companies have the capacity to employ full-time technicians, there are many aspects of a large and complex enterprise where the staff may not be sufficient. Especially for specialized maintenance work such as elevators and escalators, heating, ventilation, air conditioning, entrance and access systems or other facility requirements such as plumbing and landscaping, outsourcing maximizes business results.

How does outsourcing maintenance tasks work?

Outsourcing is the commercial practice of contracting a third party to perform tasks and services that are typically carried out by in-house staff. Especially since the 1990s, outsourcing began to establish itself as a cost-cutting strategy for organizations of all sizes. Today, outsourcing is a common practice, and executives from various industries are well aware of it.

In the near and distant future, outsourcing maintenance and engineering activities will be considered a more practical option.

Simon Chapman, DVP Services Global Product Manager at dormakaba

“A contracted service provider can also offer specialized services for which managers may not be able to justify increasing their in-house full-time staff,” says Simon Chapman, DVP Services Global Product Manager at dormakaba.

While outsourcing is traditionally associated with the IT sector and online work, facility-based companies can also benefit from its many advantages. Below are the three benefits that outsourcing maintenance and engineering work brings to companies of all sizes and needs.

1. Relief for management

A large part of regular maintenance work is associated with administrative tasks that require many management hours. With a fixed contract for regular maintenance, a highly specialized technician inspects a building and carries out all necessary repairs at regular intervals.

This way, outsourcing technical tasks eases the administrative burden for facility managers. They save time and also do not have to rent or buy special equipment for possible repairs, as the specialist technician is equipped with the right tools. Likewise, the technician’s access to these tools means that no additional budget or storage space for technical equipment needs to be managed.

2. Cost reduction in lean times

Especially for facility managers working with a tight budget, outsourcing technical tasks can be ideal. In this way, they can find the hard-to-achieve balance between cost reduction and securing and optimizing their facilities. When building managers outsource technical tasks, they can, due to their contracts, pay only for the services they need.

Furthermore, many technical staff are often generalists, but as technologies evolve, more and more routine maintenance tasks are being taken over by specialists. With outsourcing, however, facilities can use technicians with complex skills according to a simple plan.

3. Scalability in a time of change

In a world characterized by unpredictability, entering into maintenance contracts can help facility managers keep up with sudden changes or shifting needs in their companies. For example, a dramatic change in the number of visitors to a facility can lead to an increased need for certain tasks. And while onboarding new in-house staff can be a lengthy process, support from third parties is usually faster and easier.

Therefore, outsourcing maintenance work and technical tasks is a flexible and scalable solution to remain resilient and respond to changes as soon as they occur.

Technical tasks: to outsource or not to outsource?

All in all, outsourcing technical tasks based on a regular contract can be a powerful business decision to empower facility managers. That said, every facility has individual maintenance needs, the scope of which can only be determined by the managers who know the complexity of their operations best. By analyzing their resources compared to their needs, they can find the optimal balance between outsourcing regular maintenance and internal support to achieve the greatest possible benefit.