Services Parts Inventories, Operations Costing Industry Billions
Aberdeen: Despite high profit opportunities, few companies have dedicated necessary resources and strategies to maximize services parts operations
Aberdeen: Despite high profit opportunities, few companies have dedicated necessary resources and strategies to maximize services parts operations
IndustryWeek
IndustryWeek
- Aberdeen suggested corporations align and coordinate service parts planning and operations across and extended service network. Companies that did this were able to reduce inventory levels by 10 to 15 percent. These enterprises also reported half the number of stockouts of those coordinating service parts planning and execution activities at the local level.
- Aberdeen also identified outsourcing of service parts management activities to logistics service providers as a successful strategy to drive improvements in service chain operations. While only 20 percent of respondents currently use logistics service providers to support their operations, those that do use them reported better service parts management than their peers. Specifically, they were able to increase inventory turns, reduce stockouts, improve fill rates and have 90 percent on-time delivery.
- Next, the study recommended companies aggregate, classify and enhance their service parts data. Data should be cleansed and validated for accuracy and completeness. Then it must be normalized and mapped to a common classification scheme. "A company cannot begin to effectively mine and analyze service parts information for planning activities until such classification is complete," Aberdeen warned.
- Finally, companies should automate service parts planning and execution with service parts management solutions. Such solutions can incorporate network visibility and event management capabilities with analytics and service-specific planning algorithms. They can also provide role-based access and alerts for stakeholders with the ability to make plans and decisions.
