fastening & assembly solutions and technology - Approved Business

eductions; add to that subsequent
opportunities for weeding
out low turnover items
and eliminating duplication
across the whole enterprise.
2 Frees up valuable floorspace
– new lines mean storing
spares to meet service and
maintenance needs, putting
pressure on storerooms
already overstocked with
excessive inventory; by utilising
vertical space and high
density storage technology,
modern vending machines are
designed to hold a vast array
of products within a highly
compact footprint, freeing up
manufacturing floorspace, a
commodity usually in short
supply.
3 Improves staff productivity –
a major cause of downtime is
when staff have to spend time
collecting spares from a central
storeroom, building
cumulatively into hours of
lost production; point-of-use
vending machines serve the
location where they’re
installed, dramatically cutting
the times taken to travel,
locate and retrieve parts,
while touch-screen interfaces
with ‘shopping basket’ functions
speed transaction times.
4 Drives down inventory spend
– the most powerful way to
reduce spend is to restrict
access to inventory, with a
complete lock-down ensuring
that only authorised users can
remove items; a full audit trail
and subsequent monitoring of
usage down to user level will
identify wasteful employees
or departments and indicate
excessive maintenance activities,
in turn highlighting
issues of asset reliability.
5 Optimises costly parts usage
– modern machines like Pro-
Vyda can allocate a unique
status to each compartment,
so that refurbished or reconditioned
parts can be dispensed
instead of new items, saving
on routine costs; the machine
will also deliver the exact
amount of parts required,
rather than automatically dispensing
standard packs of 10
or 20, again optimising usage.
6 Eliminates staff pilfering – as
economic pressures mount,
workplace theft tends to
increase, whilst at particular
times of the year certain items
are consumed at greater levels
than normal, such as gloves
around bank holidays, paint
pens and markers during
school vacations and batteries
at Christmas; locking down
access and making staff fully
accountable for what they are
consuming, has a remedial
impact on such behaviour.
7 Reduces employer liability –
as all transactions are logged
against a user, an employer
can identify precisely what an
individual has received, providing
vital evidence of
access to essential personal
protective equipment in the
event of a health and safety
incident and helping avoid
expensive litigation; real-time
access to vending machine
data also enables supervisors
to immediately question why
incorrect items are being
taken out.
8 Provides 24/7 parts availability
– one of the issues that
management has to balance is
the cost of either paying
stockroom staff to support
shift workers or allow
unmanned stores access out
of hours; vending machines
eliminate that problem by
providing 24/7 controlled
access and monitoring, while
a feature like Pro-Vyda’s
reservation facility enables
off-site staff to pre-book parts
for planned maintenance
whenever they arrive.
9 Minimises costly downtime –
with manual storerooms
where there are no routine
stock checks, there are often
discrepancies between inventory
records and physical
items on the shelves, leading
to stockouts at critical points
FAST OCTOBER 2011
and consequent downtime;
vending machines ensure
accurate data and userdefined
depth of stock on
vital parts, as well as incorporating
expiration and calibration
dates against any part.
10 Improves budget control – as
well as avoiding bloated
inventories and restricting
access to parts, vending
machines like Pro-Vyda can
allocate budget ceilings to
individuals, cells and departments,
ensuring budget compliance;
given strict control of
parts distribution and automatic
restocking, stockholdings
can be kept below one or
two months in hand and complete
stock checks can be carried
out within hours, rather
than days.
And contrary to the view that
workers might object to point-ofuse
vending machines, Propeller
has found that hardworking staff
respond positively to the idea of
having the right parts in the right
place at the right time, rather than
wasting energy tracking down
items themselves, and appreciate
facilities for reserving MRO consumables
for upcoming maintenance
and repair jobs, instead of
finding much-needed parts out of
stock at the last moment.
Tony Goodwin is CEO of
PROPELLER GB 0191 569 1690
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