5 Tips to Keep Track of Equipment Inventory

• April 12, 2022
• Diana Nadim

Maintaining a complete and accurate equipment inventory list is crucial for all companies. This list gives you control over your business’ assets..

You don’t want to be surprised when adding up the costs of equipment losses due to inefficient control of your assets. When you use asset tracking software such as Assetbots to assist you with tracking equipment, you eliminate all inefficiencies and minimize losses. Tracking equipment also helps extend the lifecycle of all your company’s equipment. Here are a few informative tips to help you keep track of your company’s equipment inventory.

Equipment Inventory Tracking Tips and Tricks

An effective tracking program helps your company save time and money. Following these tips will help you improve all aspects of your equipment tracking process.

1. Perform an Inventory Audit

The first and most crucial step is to assess what you have. It is one thing to have a general idea of your company’s assets and another to take a pen and paper and note down each asset. The combined value of your company’s assets might shock you. The inventory list you compile must include all your assets and basic information about them. Such information includes:

• Asset value
• Owner
• Location
• Physical and working conditions
• Make
• Model
• Serial number
• Purchase date
• Lifecycle end date

Be sure to periodically update the inventory list you compile to include new equipment and remove old equipment you have phased out. This step might seem labor-intensive, but it works well to help you keep track of where everything is and prevent loss and theft.

2. Create a Policy for Equipment Inventory

Coming up with an inventory list is great, but setting down a policy for everyone to follow is even better. With tools like Assetbots, the focus is on helping your company to define roles and responsibilities and develop vital management strategies. The policies and procedures you develop should cover responsibilities during emergencies and routine audit checks. You should establish processes and procedures about equipment purchases and usage. Also, your processes should cover tagging and logging all new equipment into your management system. All electronic devices such as smartphones and laptops should be provisioned with your company’s security software.

3. Track Equipment Usage

Keeping track of damages and loss of equipment is a must. However, tracking day-to-day usage also helps to uncover trends you might have missed. Tracking daily usage requires finding out if the equipment has one or several shared users. The information you gather also uncovers usage based on remote and in-office operations. In the end, the information helps in decision-making about management and purchasing. After all, tracking usage also highlights the equipment not in use. Imagine the amount of equipment gathering dust and losing value because you don’t know it exists.

4. Regularly Maintain the Equipment

You want your equipment to last as long as possible, and working with an equipment inventory service can help ensure that happens. You will save yourself the headache of managing multiple maintenance schedules by having one place to notate the regular maintenance that is needed. If it works best to carry out routine checks every week, ensure you stick to that schedule. Knowing the condition of your equipment allows you to conduct the necessary repairs, keeping equipment in good shape. Ultimately, this saves your organization time and money and facilitates proper workflow.

Employees’ productivity can dwindle because of random and unplanned repairs. Lack of productivity translates to lost time and money. Regular maintenance helps identify equipment that has reached the end of life. You can sell some of this equipment to recyclers and disposition companies. On the inventory list, the indicated lifecycle end date helps you maximize the resale value of the equipment by knowing when to sell it.

5. Examine Trends

At this point, you have enough details about your equipment and its use. The next step involves looking for trends to shape your planning and decision-making. For example, if an employee tends to put in repair requests too often, training is necessary to guide them on caring for equipment. From trend analysis, you can also identify the brands of equipment that break down frequently or stop working completely. Additionally, employees might show a preference for some types and brands of equipment, which you will learn from the study you conduct.

Benefits of Equipment inventory Tracking

Some companies neglect equipment inventory tracking, which leads to massive losses that they cannot account for. Here are ways in which inventory tracking benefits your organization:

Detailed Data Collection

Improved tracking technologies allow for real-time collection of information such as location and use of equipment. Sensors, barcodes and QR codes are excellent examples of technologies that transmit data to the dashboard for you to check.

Improved Employee Accountability

Knowing who is doing what and when helps you identify the usability of certain equipment. After all, the inventory list clearly outlines who has custody of the machine. If the machine breaks down unexpectedly, you will have someone to answer to management.

Improved Efficiency and Decreased Costs

Equipment tracking systems do heavy work that would be tiresome and time-consuming to carry out manually. Automating tracking systems reduces the amount of work involved in notifying staff about overdue returns, logging transactions, and keeping up with reservations. After finding out which equipment is overused, you can apply redistribution measures to level out wear and tear.

Applying Automated Equipment Inventory Tracking

Automated tracking systems are a new way to ease the stress and allow you to focus on other issues ailing the organization. Tracking tags are a great way to carry out your equipment management needs. Still, these tags have to be cost-effective. The most popular tag types are:

• Bar codes
• QR codes
• Radiofrequency Identification (RFID)

Take your time to determine which tag type works best for your business.

Conclusion

Keeping track of equipment inventory not only benefits your company today. It also sets the pace and clearly outlines what employees need to do in the future concerning asset management practices. Tools like Assetbots facilitates asset tracking and management practices for a smooth workflow. The process of tracking equipment is laborious without an asset tracking partner. Besides, the lack of an effective equipment inventory tracking plan will cost your company valuable time and money.

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