Today, due to a range of unprecedented disruptive economic events—such as the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, trade wars, the Great Resignation, non-favourable government regulations, and high interest rates—the Australian economy has plunged into some level of uncertainty.
The result? Businesses across industries have been exposed to widespread labour shortages, supply chain issues, and spiralling inflation. This exposure has increased operational costs across business functions, including facilities maintenance.
Despite these increases in costs, businesses can’t scale their maintenance and facilities management operations back to save costs. Doing so can seriously impact their business operations and even leave customers unsatisfied.
Due to these factors, contemporary businesses are experiencing significant financial strain and don’t have enough insurance coverage to cover their maintenance expenses.
The reliance on multiple maintenance and cleaning partners is only exacerbating these issues.
That said, there’s a silver lining—integrated facilities management services can help you save on maintenance costs by providing an all-in-one solution for all your facilities management needs. But how do they facilitate this?
From restaurants and schools to manufacturing plants and hospitals, commercial facilities in Australia must adhere to various health and safety regulations based on the industry.
In addition to national regulations, they must comply with state, regional, and even international standards to ensure that their products and business facilities remain safe for customers and employees.
That said, many businesses are charged with compliance infringements and are served penalties that add up to thousands of dollars. For instance, the penalty charged for exposing employees to life-threatening or injury-causing situations can include fines of up to $600,000.
This is in addition to revoking any compliance or health and safety certifications businesses may have invested significant resources to secure.
They must spend additional financial resources to re-secure these certifications, adding to the already ballooning maintenance costs.
While managing compliance can become a challenging and complex process when you work with multiple maintenance and cleaning partners, integrated facilities management gives you a single point of authority and oversight, allowing you to monitor your compliance status regularly without having to talk to multiple authorised personnel.
Integrated facilities management services also give you more transparency into the running of your business facilities, allowing you to make informed budgetary decisions to optimise resources, ensure compliance, and reduce costs.
Repairs can become very expensive if they’re not detected and actioned in the very early stages. For instance, a neglected clog in the sewer can accumulate over the years and completely block the sewers, forcing you to at least shut down your operations until the issue is resolved.
This can cost you in multiple ways; you lose revenue by halting your business operations and have to pay significantly higher repair bills when you finally get to repair the problem.
Fortunately, integrated facilities management offers an intuitive solution to overcome these problems. These service providers can facilitate predictive and proactive maintenance operations in addition to reactive maintenance. This helps reduce the risk of accidents and helps you identify problems early.
They can also create and maintain a detailed asset management register, which can provide insights into the status, remaining lifetime, and depreciation. These insights can help you make more data-driven decisions about repairing and replacing assets in your facilities.
Studies have shown that safety and comfort in the workplace are top priorities for many employees across industries. This is because safe, welcoming and hygienic work environments have a positive impact on productivity, employee satisfaction, and even mental health.
If you fail to present your teams with a workplace that supports their work and wellbeing, you’re more likely to experience high turnover rates in your organisations. This means that you lose returns on investments you’ve made to train and upskill your teams and have to incur additional costs to replace the resigned employees.
By working with an integrated facilities management service provider, you can create a safer, cleaner, and more ergonomic workplace that empowers your teams to perform better and make them loyal to your organisation, thus reducing turnover.
While facilities management is typically considered a cost-cutting measure, its impact on the effectiveness and efficiency of your business operations can deliver significant cost savings.
This can be further compounded by working with facilities management partners that provide all required services under one roof.
This eliminates the need to work with multiple partners and spend thousands of dollars on services that don’t complement each other.