Service is Standard… Isn’t It?

RESOURCES // BLOG // SERVICE IS STANDARD… ISN’T IT?

< 1 Min Read

Service is Standard… Isn’t It?

8 Things to Know Before Choosing an Equipment Maintenance Plan

In today’s world, especially on the commercial side, you hear about service all the time. Every service company likes to promise the best service plans at the cheapest price. In most cases, you get what you pay for. However, that expensive equipment maintenance plan may not be the best either. So, how do you ensure that you get the best service possible to keep your operation running smoothly at the best price?

First, get several bids and compare them closely. During your search you will hear about preventative maintenance, technician response time and machine uptime (to name a few), along with some relatively new services offerings like remote monitoring. All are critical and sound great, but are you really getting the quality and response you expect for the money? For example, what’s the point of fast arrival at your facility if the technician lacks experience to repair the device or machine quickly? In some cases, “quick” or “fast” may mean the next day or longer. You paid for “preventative maintenance”, but have you ever validated what is being done during that inspection? How long did the inspection take and what exactly did the technician do?

Service Plan Checklist

When shopping for an equipment maintenance plan, here are 8 critical things to ask yourself…

  1. How close is my local technician? Is there more than one who can support my product?
  2. Do they have a response time guarantee? If so, what is it?
  3. Does this company offer 24/7 response services? Be careful here. Many say yes, but unless you pre-arrange and pay a stand-by fee you do not necessarily have access to that service. The best service companies offer 24/7 access and only charge you when that service is used.
  4. Who are the other customers? Is there anyone locally I can speak with? Get contacts and numbers to call for a reference. Most companies will happily share details on their experience.
  5. Can I get a pre-work check-off sheet? Get a copy of the Preventative Maintenance plan and review it in detail with your technician prior to doing the work. A good inspection is far more than making the machine look good, there are many calibrations to be checked and parts to be replaced.
  6. How does the service company manage parts inventory? Do they know the normal operating life of a part so they can proactively replace them before they fail? This one item can have the largest impact on machine availability and optimum performance.
  7. Does the service company offer remote monitoring? If yes, great. But can they repair a machine remotely as well?
  8. Am I buying too much service? The service company may offer “the works”, with unlimited calls, multiple inspections and covers everything in your production facility…but do you need all that? You know your production volumes and if you have a back-up machine or maybe more time to get the work completed, a more “Limited” agreement may be a better fit and can save you thousands of dollars.

Service is standard, right? Not even close. Do your homework, spend wisely and you can end up with the plan that fits your unique needs and doesn’t break the bank.

At Bell and Howell, we work with companies to create customized service plans with tenured technicians to fix unique business needs. Let us know how we can help you maximize uptime for your operation.

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Breathing New Life into Equipment

RESOURCES // BLOG // BREATHING NEW LIFE INTO EQUIPMENT

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Breathing New Life into Equipment

OCT 18, 2018

Should you buy new or keep your old equipment? For some organizations, investing in new machinery may not always be the best answer. Long-term questions about mailing volumes and workload play a vital part in this decision, but what are your options? What is the ROI? These are critical questions many managers face as they determine the next phase of their mailing environment. Fortunately, there are several options for your aging fleet, including complete machine rebuild, refresh, or refurbished equipment.

In many cases, rebuilding equipment provides a more affordable option. Here, you can access significant cost savings and enable equipment to run efficiently for many more years. Most service organizations will also recognize a rebuild as a fresh start. This allows for additional service savings to further reduce your cost per piece. As part of a machine rebuild, you can also choose to install newer technical upgrades. These ensure your machine not only looks new, but also performs with greater integrity or increased throughput.

Buy Refurbished Equipment, Save Big

Looking beyond the benefits of rebuilding an aging fleet, what about simply buying a used or rebuilt machine instead of a new one? Another option many companies may not always hear about is whenever a new piece of machinery is installed, the preceding machine is usually acquired and stored by the manufacturer. These older machines can be rebuilt and made to look and operate like new for a fraction of the cost. This may be the most beneficial option for a company that may want newer technology but not have the budget for it. Think you cannot afford that new unit? Think again.

Breathing new life into your aging equipment may not be necessary for some companies. But, for those that can take advantage of their options, great solutions exist to keep your equipment running and looking like new. Bell and Howell offers all of these services and, in some cases, we stock rebuilt machines in-house that are ready to ship. Couple this with a world-renowned service program, and you will remain competitive for years to come.

For more information about this program, please reach out to your local sales associate and don’t forget to tell them…Service sent you!

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Reconditioning Services: A Makeover for Your Machine

RESOURCES // BLOG // RECONDITIONING SERVICES: A MAKEOVER FOR YOUR MACHINE

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Reconditioning Services: A Makeover for Your Machine

AUGUST 29, 2018

The term “one size fits all” rarely stands true in any scenario. But, in the industrial automation market, it’s never the case. Each business has its own set of unique needs – and budgets – when it comes to equipment and its reconditioning services.

With evolving technology, challenges arise in finding new parts for legacy systems. This forces companies to either replace old equipment or add new solutions to meet growth and capacity needs. Aside from costly, this process can also disrupt your operations, which results in unplanned downtime, increase in labor hours and more.

Save Your Machines and Your Money

Thanks to innovative reconditioning services, you don’t have to say goodbye to outdated or underperforming equipment. Just like you wouldn’t have to buy a new computer to update it to the latest OS, you can upgrade your industrial equipment to enhance speed, performance or capabilities.

At Bell and Howell, we provide several levels of Product Reconditioning Services. The first tier of our service offering is Field Change Orders (FCO). Here, we custom-engineer solutions that let customers optimize their systems with new technologies or functions. For example, we can outfit production mail solutions with enhancements like quality control through end-of-process vision systems.

When new, refurbished or remanufactured may not be the right answer, FCOs let you extend the life of the equipment you already own. Specialists perform FCOs on your equipment at your facility to minimize downtime and avoid hefty shipping costs. While our roots lay in mail production systems, we are also the trusted partner to manufacturers in other industries including wide-format printing, robotics and industrial packing equipment. We can perform FCOs on both Bell and Howell-manufactured solutions as well as equipment from other OEMs.

Learn more about FCOs and Bell and Howell’s other Product Reconditioning Services (PRS), or contact us today to find out how we can help customize a solution to meet your specific equipment needs.

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Remote Monitoring and Repair: Customer Service at the Speed of Light

RESOURCES // BLOG // REMOTE MONITORING AND REPAIR: CUSTOMER SERVICE AT THE SPEED OF LIGHT

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Remote Monitoring and Repair: Customer Service at the Speed of Light

July 19, 2018

In today’s demanding, fast-paced market, remote monitoring and repair is a need, not a want. The delivery window for service technicians to arrive and perform equipment repair has grown smaller and smaller. Gone are the days of waiting until tomorrow. Many will not accept “same day” or even 4-hour response times. We now stand at a point where physically getting to the site improves only slightly. Struggling with increased traffic or staffing enough people to respond to growing demand remains. Maybe someday there will be a way to truly “beam” someone over, but until then, we must provide a service alternative that meets our customer’s expectations.

By linking to a machine remotely and watching it perform every minute of every day, you stay ahead. You can detect possible failure before it happens. In those cases, you can either fix the issue remotely, or you can immediately dispatch a technician to the site before the customer even spots a pending problem. This gives an almost instant response to the service need. And, with remote repair, it gives instant repair and recovery when needed.

Maintenance Evolves

This technology continues to evolve, allowing us to monitor even the most sophisticated equipment. But, it also lets us monitor legacy products built without this ability. New electronic sensors in the right location can quickly learn normal machine operation parameters. If/when the unit deviates from those normal parameters, it triggers an alert. Here, human intervention can then correct and hopefully avoid unnecessary downtime. Not only will this machine learning technology limit equipment downtime, but it can also help generate data analytics. This data helps us better understand machine performance, which the customer uses to maximize equipment efficiency.

Can we provide service at the speed of light? Yes, thanks to remote monitoring and repair. But, watch out: once your customers experience this level of response, they will never expect anything less.

Learn more about Bell and Howell’s Automated Equipment Services today, or contact us to find out how we can help your company achieve maximum uptime through remote monitoring and repair services.

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Vision-Guided Vehicles Improve Efficiency and Productivity

RESOURCES // BLOG // VISION-GUIDED VEHICLES IMPROVE EFFICIENCY AND PRODUCTIVITY

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Vision-Guided Vehicles Improve Efficiency and Productivity

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Enhancing the Robot Room Service Experience

RESOURCES // BLOG // ENHANCING THE ROBOT ROOM SERVICE EXPERIENCE

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Enhancing the Robot Room Service Experience

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Report: Ranking the Direct Mail Service Providers

RESOURCES // BLOG // REPORT: RANKING THE TOP DIRECT MAIL SERVICE PROVIDERS

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Report: Ranking the Direct Mail Service Providers

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Bell and Howell Ranked 99th Best Training Organization in World

RESOURCES // BLOG // BELL AND HOWELL RANKED 99TH BEST TRAINING ORGANIZATION IN WORLD

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Bell and Howell Ranked 99th Best Training Organization in World

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Focusing on the Promise of Robotics

RESOURCES // BLOG // FOCUSING ON THE PROMISE OF ROBOTICS

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Focusing on the Promise of Robotics

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Bell and Howell Makes Training Top 125 List for Second Consecutive Year

RESOURCES // BLOG // Bell and Howell Makes Training Top 125 List for Second Consecutive Year

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Bell and Howell Makes Training Top 125 List for Second Consecutive Year

Training Magazine, the leading business publication for L&D professionals, recently announced the winners for its annual Training Top 125. Companies like these achieve excellence in employer-sponsored training and development programs. Furthermore, 2016 marked the second consecutive year that Bell and Howell achieved this distinction. An outside research company and Training Magazine editors evaluate, name and rank the winners. Bell and Howell has ranked in the Training Top 125 a record 12 times.

Don Bullock, Bell and Howell’s Vice President of Customer Support Services, said the award reflects the company’s evolution. In recent years, it has worked to become a premier, flexible and customer-centric organization.

“We have the collaborative ability to deliver innovative service and technology solutions. These enrich our customers’ communications and fulfillment,” he said. “This is thanks to our field service team remaining sharp and well-equipped. They maintain, repair and optimize the hundreds of systems we support.”

Each of Bell and Howell’s customer service engineers and technical service engineers train in a world-class training center at the company’s Durham, NC headquarters. Additionally, these field service personnel travel to the center to undergo extensive training to become certified proficient on any new system that the company’s service business chooses to support.

The Training Top 125 awards are scheduled to be presented at the Training Conference & Expo on Jan. 30, in San Diego, CA.

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