CMMS Can be Critical for Safety and Compliance

Food quality/safety: Work orders can be printed with accompanying SOPs, GMPs, HACCP procedures and more. “Quality and research can actually tie into the system. Maybe there are metal detectors or checkweighers they need to maintain and calibrate for their inspectors, and they need to know who worked on them last,” Miller says.

• CIP/Process sanitation: The sanitation department can share documentation such as CIP procedures, which can be hosted in the maintenance system. “I coach many customers on the use of CMMS for CIP. You’d be amazed how many sanitation departments don’t use anything to document this.” It’s a no-brainer to use the CMMS to track cleaning for assets already in the maintenance system, he says. Documentation, which can include images and material safety data sheets (MSDSs), improve safety in handling chemicals as well as complying with FDA regulations and other standards.

• Worker safety: When an unsafe platform in front of an oven is classified as part of the oven, the safety manger may write a note or a safety work order. But it lacks the depth that a CMMS/EAM system can bring to track the problem and priority and its cause. A recurring problem can be diagnosed for its root cause. That fix can be a particular operator that needs retraining or a flawed work process that needs to be revised.

• Security: The CMMS can track personnel from building and site entry to exit, including through hazardous area access, providing procedures and tracking locks and gates. RFID technology can be applied to personnel, materials and assets throughout the plant.

• Environmental: The CMMS can record the delivery of liquid ingredients into 2,500-gallon tanks, handling of 5,000-gallon grease traps, the movement of other materials per EPA Title V operating permits (also 40 CFR part 70), air emissions and effluent. Likewise, the system can manage MSDSs and reporting under SARA Title III/the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act.

• At the docks: While maintenance there is relatively low, plants still need to meet safety and cleanliness standards that the maintenance system can track, such as forklift maintenance, the use of food-grade grease when food contact is an issue, segregating food materials from cleaning chemicals and other documentation required by FDA regulations or standards such as those from AIB.

• Pest control: A grain manufacturer realized its CMMS could be a part of its AIB compliance when it numbered and tracked its 150 rat traps in the system. “They have to know where those traps are in the building, they can’t just put them out there and forget about them,” says Miller. A clipboard can be lost and it lacks the ability to easily track the traps and their contents.