Do you conduct regular inspections of your properties?
If not, your building is at risk of costly equipment failures, dissatisfied tenants, and more. Without consistent inspections, it’s easy for minor problems to go unnoticed until your asset fails – resulting in increased expenses.
And, equipment failures can create a negative experience for tenants. This could cause them to look for another building that’s more comfortable and less prone to problems – leading to decreased revenue.
How can you reduce risk related to inspections in your building?
With building inspections software. This software makes it easy to conduct regular, standardized inspections across multiple properties. And, with mobile capabilities, your engineers can conduct inspections (and catch problems) from anywhere. Plus, inspection reports and a historical dashboard view make it easy to see what’s happening in your properties.
Could building inspection software be right for you? Read on to find out how it can help you reduce risk at your property.
Step 1: Standardize Inspections
The first step to reducing risk at your property with building inspections software is creating standardized inspections.
When your team does inspections, you likely get different data every time. Whether the data varies from person to person or from time to time, you don’t get the exact same info from each inspection.
This makes it hard to compare your property now to how it was during the last inspection. Without this comparison, you don’t know what needs preventive maintenance to keep it in top shape. So, you might not perform maintenance on a piece of equipment that needs it – with the result being costly equipment failure.
Plus, without a standardized inspection, it’s easy for your team to miss equipment altogether. So, you have some equipment that never gets inspected – leading to a higher risk of asset failure.
How can you ensure your team inspects your building the same way every time?
By creating a standardized inspection template. While you could do this in word, excel, or any other manual way, it can be time-consuming to create a thorough inspection template.
Instead, you can use building operations software or inspections software with a drag and drop builder. With this software, you can select from a variety of questions – like checkboxes, dropdowns, and text responses. So, you don’t have to spend time coming up with these questions on your own.
And, once you create a template, your team can use it at every property you manage. That way, you always get the same data from every question. Plus, you know your team is inspecting every important building asset – reducing the risk of expensive equipment failure.
One way to reduce risk with building inspections software is standardizing inspections.
Step 2: Conduct Inspections from Anywhere
Another way to reduce risk at your property is with building inspections software that allows your team to conduct inspections on the go.
To do inspections, your team has to be moving throughout your building – not sitting at a desk. But, your team might only be able to log inspections data from their desk. So, your team has to conduct an inspection and take note of the findings to formally record later.
This multi-step process makes it easy for your team to forget about issues they spot during the inspection. Without a way to record their findings in the moment, these problems never get logged. So, your equipment isn’t properly maintained – leading to costly equipment failures that could have been avoided with preventive maintenance.
Instead of desk-bound inspections, you can have your team conduct inspections from anywhere. While you could have them record these inspections on a sheet they turn in, this manual process can drag out inspections. And, waste your team’s time.
An easier way to conduct inspections on the go is with building inspection software. This software has both desktop and mobile apps, complete with an offline mode. So, your team can upload pictures, write notes, and complete your inspection form from anywhere in your building. That way, they can quickly record any issues they see – so you can address them.
Conducting inspections from anywhere is another way to reduce risk with building inspections software.
Step 3: Submit Work Orders on the Spot
Along with standardizing inspections and conducting them on the go, submitting work orders during inspections is another way building inspection software can reduce risk.
As your team conducts inspections, they’ll likely see equipment that needs immediate maintenance. Or, other areas of your building that need attention. But, if they have to wait until they get back to a computer to submit a work order, it’s easy to forget some (or all) of the work orders needed.
When work orders slip through the cracks, your equipment is more likely to fail. And, these equipment failures can create a negative tenant experience. For example, if your HVAC fails in the middle of summer, your tenants have to deal with a hot building until it’s fixed.
This inconvenience and discomfort could cause your tenants to look for another building that’s always comfortable. So, your tenant turnover would increase – reducing your building’s revenue.
While you could require your team to write down any work order they think are necessary during an inspection, this still leaves room for forgetfulness. Instead, you can use building inspection software that lets you submit work orders wherever your team is – including in areas of your building without the internet.
That way, as soon as your team sees the need for a work order, it can get logged from a mobile app. This makes it hard for your team to forget work orders. And, easy for you to address any problems in your building – ensuring they never cause a negative tenant experience.
Being able to submit work orders on the spot is another way to reduce risk at your property with building inspection software.
Step 4: Create Inspection Reports
The last step to reducing risk at your property with building inspections software is generating inspection reports.
After conducting inspections, you need to be able to see inspections trends across your properties. And, you need to present these trends to building owners and other management in a way that’s easy to understand.
To find trends, you have to sort through spreadsheets, word docs, and filing cabinets (to name a few) to find all the info you need. Plus, you have to manually aggregate all this data – which is beyond time-consuming. With this jumble of inspection data, it can be hard to spot any trends – much less convey these trends to building owners.
An easier way to get a high-level understanding of your inspection data is with building inspections software. It can automatically turn the info your team inputs during every inspection into an easy to understand report.
That way, you can quickly tell which areas of your building need extra work. And, you can present this data to owners in a way that’s professional and easy to understand – reflecting well on you and your team.
One last way to reduce risk at your property with building inspections software is by creating inspections reports to understand the data.
Wrapping It Up
Regular inspections are crucial to keeping your building in top shape. But, if your inspections are inconsistent, it’s hard to monitor your whole buildings. And, if your team can’t conduct inspections on the go, it’s easy for them to forget important info.
Plus, not being able to create work orders on the spot can lead to equipment failure that creates a negative tenant experience. Manually aggregating inspection data can make it difficult for you and building owners to see the big picture of building health.
The easiest way to reduce these risks at your property is with building inspection software. This software makes it easy to create standardized inspection templates. And, mobile apps allow your team to conduct inspections and submit work orders from anywhere. Plus, automatically generated inspections reports make it easy to put inspection data to use in your building.
That way, you can keep your building in great shape by staying on top of maintenance – before equipment needs a costly replacement. And, you can increase tenant satisfaction by having a building that’s always comfortable for them to use – reducing tenant turnover and increasing revenue.
Looking for building inspections software? Consider using Prism. With Prism’s inspection module, you can create inspection templates, conduct inspections and submit work orders on the go, generate inspection reports, and more.
