Work Order

A work order is either PM-generated, created via a fault report, or via a service request. The user can then prepare the work orders for a final accomplishment. Among the information that can be prepared are the budget costs, document information, material, and personnel resources. This means that all necessary information is already available on the work order when the tasks on the work order are to be performed. 

Tools can be rented in to work orders to carry out maintenance tasks. The tools can either be rented in from suppliers or use in house rental tools. These are supported by rent in to work order and work order internal charging processes.

Work orders may also be used in a rental flow with the purpose of mobilization and demobilization of rental assets before and after a rental period. These types of work orders are generated for sales parts in a rental process that have mobilization codes connected in the Maintenance tab on the sales part. The mobilization codes are also connected to standard jobs, thus driving material and resource demands for the mobilization/demobilization work. A mobilization work order is created when the sales part is reserved on a rental customer order line. A demobilization work order is created when receiving back the rental part from the customer in the rental flow. The directive on the work order states if it is a mobilization or demobilization work order. Apart from the text in the directive these works order have the same behavior and functions as works orders in general. 

All manually registered work orders are automatically assigned a number from 1 to 599,999, in a sequential order. Work orders that are PM-generated are assigned a number beginning from 600,000. This number is defined when installing IFS Applications and therefore can be changed to another number series (e.g., 12000000) if necessary.

A work order can be in progress in IFS/Maintenance for an unlimited period of time. Costs, time, and other information can continuously be reported in for the work order. If IFS/Service Management is used, the information on the work order is transferred to IFS/Customer Orders for invoicing purposes. If IFS Mobile application is installed, the work orders can be processed in mobile devices while communicating with IFS system.

Since a work order can be in progress for an unlimited period of time, there is a status system that defines what can be done with the work order. The status system also facilitates the selection of work orders that can be performed in several windows in IFS/Maintenance. It is not mandatory to use all the statuses. A new work order has one of the following two statuses:

• Work Request - Work orders created in the Prepare Work Order or Active Work Orders window will receive this status. PM-generated work orders may receive this status as well. For work orders generated through separate PM actions, the initial status will depend on the value entered for the WO_GEN_INIT_STATE object property.*
• Fault Report - This is the status for a new fault report. If IFS Applications for Service Management is used, the status for a new service request is set to Fault Report. 

(*Following values can be entered for the WO_GEN_INIT_STATE object property: WORKREQUEST, OBSERVED, UNDERPREPARATION, PREPARED and RELEASED. The value entered will be set as the initial status for wok orders generated from separate PM actions. If a value is not entered or an invalid value is given for the object property, or the work order is generated from a route PM action, the work order will receive the WorkRequest status at generation.)

The status is then normally changed to one of the following:

• Observed - This status means that the work order is observed but not yet ready to be prepared. There might be some information missing on the work order that must be added before it can be prepared. 
• Under Preparation - This status means that the work order is to be prepared, i.e., you can for example specify operations, reserve material from inventory, connect tools and facilities and connect standard jobs for the work order. You can also connect requisitions to the work order. A planned start date can be set for a work order. After the planned start date has been set, the work order symbol is displayed in the Gantt graph. 

After the work order has been prepared, the status is normally changed to Prepared or Released. Occasionally there is a need to not follow the ordinary sequence of status modifications. In this case, the system allows you to change the status differently, either in the forward direction or in the reverse direction, for example from Work Request status directly to Released status or to reverse from Released to Prepared status.

• Prepared - This status means that you can modify the prepared information, for example, the internal craft resources, the reserved material, and the information on requisitions of material and external craft.
• Released - This status means that you can issue material for the work order. You can also return to stock the material that has been issued earlier. You can modify the prepared information, for example, the craft information and planned start date.
• Assigned - This status means that the work order has been assigned to the employee who will be responsible for executing the work specified on the work order. If the work order is scheduled in the Scheduling Engine, and the plan which is returned to IFS Applications is suitable, you can assign the work order to the relevant employee (using the Assign to Allocated Executed By option or the Assign to Current User option). When this is done, the work order is automatically set to the Assigned status. This status can be manually set as well. If the work order is transferred to mobile application, the status of the work order changes to Assigned.
• Accepted - This status means that the employee has accepted the work order and is responsible for executing the work.
• On Route - If the employee is required to travel to the location of the work order, the status of the work order should be set to On Route.
• Started - This status means that the work that is specified on the work order can be started. You can modify the prepared information if there is a need for doing that. 
• Work Done - This status means that the work that was specified on the work order has been performed. In this status, information on the performed work is entered, for example, causes and a description of the work done. Also information on time spent and external costs for the work order is entered in this status. Travel expenses connected to a work order can be reported in IFS/Travel Expense. These expenses are displayed in Report In Work Order, the Postings tab. No material transactions can be made after this status.
• Reported - This status means that time transactions are to be authorized. A completion date is to be set for the work order. 
• Finished - This status means that the work order is a historical work order, i.e., you cannot change any information on the work order. If material has been reserved for the work order but not issued, the reservations are deleted when the status is changed to Finished status. The Historical Work Orders or Historical Routes shows information on work orders that are historical. If you need to modify a historical work order, you can reopen it by using the Reopen operation. After saving the modified information the status must be changed to Finished.  
• Cancelled - This status means that the work order is canceled and all the information becomes historical. A work order can be canceled while in any status other than Assigned, Accepted, On Route, or Finished, as long as there are no postings, active purchase requisitions, or active or closed purchase orders connected to it. In work order structures, when a parent work order is canceled the underlying structure also will get canceled. The Historical Work Orders or Historical Routes shows information on work orders that are canceled. Canceled work orders cannot be reopened.

The work order is used in IFS/Maintenance, and in IFS Applications for Service Management.