Unnecessary Storerooms
In most cases, storerooms should be created based on accounting function instead of physical proximity. Your plant may have many different buildings that store inventory, but that doesn’t mean you need a separate storeroom for the machine shop, the tool shed, the Conex box, etc. To distinguish between physical areas, use a prefix in the bin number. For example “TL-“ for tool shed, “CX-“ for Conex box, or “MN-“ for the main warehouse.
As a rule of thumb, always use as few storerooms as possible. Additional storerooms will generally make things less convenient.
Moving inventory between storerooms is more cumbersome than simply moving it between bins.
The likelihood of errors rises dramatically. Things like receiving POs to the wrong storeroom or winding up with duplicate bin locations.
You will have to remember to select the correct storeroom on all storeroom-related reports. Users will also have to select the correct storeroom when checking out parts, etc.
Each new user will require specific security rights to each warehouse.
Here are a few examples of valid reasons for dividing storerooms. Even in these cases, it might still be better to keep things together, but at least these reasons are worth having a conversation about.
Capitalized Status
Taxability
Ownership
Obsolete vs. In-use Items
Items that should not be visible to all users.
It is quite common to encounter plants with several storerooms that are not in use at all, or else they have only a few items (usually due to the mistakes mentioned earlier). Consolidating storerooms is usually a fairly simple bit of data surgery with a high return on investment. If you have unnecessary storerooms, it would be worth discussing with your CMMS administrator.
Missing Order/Issue Unit Conversions Prevent Stock Reorders
In some cases, an item’s order unit and issue unit are different. For example, electrical conduit might be ordered in ROLLS, but issued and tracked in LF. If the current balance goes below the reorder point of 500 LF, Maximo need to know how many ROLLS to order. But what if you don’t have any conversion set up between the two units? Maximo simply skips the item when you do a stock reorder. It doesn’t even warn you that the item has been skipped!
There are two obvious ways to prevent this from happening. One is to ensure that order units and issue units are always the same, or else leave the order unit blank (Maximo then assumes a 1:1 conversion). The other is to make sure that you have conversion set up between all units (Action menu, Unit of Measure and Conversion > Conversions). This in itself can be difficult, however, because the same units might have different conversion in different scenarios. For example, a “roll” could contain vastly different lengths of material for different items. When possible, it is best to keep things simple by avoiding unit conversions.
Not Allowing Negative Balances
There is an option in the organizational setup to allow negative inventory balances. It might sound counter-intuitive, but it is usually advisable enable this. In our imperfect world, you will eventually need to check out a part that Maximo thinks you don’t have. Perhaps it was returned to the shelf without proper accounting, or miscounted during the most recent cycle count. Your frustrated technician, unable to issue the item, will probably just take it and use it without any record.
If you allow him to issue it (taking the balance into the negative), the issue will eventually be resolved via a physical inventory, at which time the available quantity will be brought back to the correct (positive) level.
Never-ending Reservations
Until you close a work order, any required parts that haven’t been used remain reserved. This makes them unavailable for use on other work orders. It also decreases the effective quantity considered when doing stock reorders, possibly triggering an unneeded PO. Making sure that you close WOs in a timely manner will reduce this problem drastically. Alternatively, you can adjust the planned material quantities if it is discovered that you will no longer require an item. TIP: If Maximo doesn’t allow you to adjust plans on WOs that are approved, in progress, or completed, ask your Maximo administrator to change the work order options to allow it.
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