ECM compliance can be a great opportunity with the right tools!

As of June 2022, a statutory ECM certification applies to all rail vehicles in the European railway sector. This will impact many things. If you’re wondering about the basics of ECM roles, tasks and responsibilities, you can read about it (in German) here: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entity_in_Charge_of_Maintenance

ECM certification is here to stay

 Now, there are two ways to see this: 

1. You can decide that ECM certification is annoying and a waste of time and energy. You can choose to continue enduring these changes and suffer the stress from strained communication processes.
2. Alternatively, you can capitalize on ECM regulations and use them to your advantage! This does imply having the right tools. It also implies digitalising existing processes to make them more efficient and painless.

How Railnova tools can help with ECM compliance   

Railfleet ECM is Railnova’s platform for ECM scheduling, delegation and traceability. It helps you to report new defects. It helps to manage campaigns and to automatically schedule preventive maintenance based on telematic counters, tolerance and time limits. 

Railnova’s Railfleet module is meant to digitize the whole maintenance planning workflow:

• Planning preventive maintenance based on real-time counters
• Digitization of driver defect reports
• Dispatching of work orders to the workshops
• Centralised tracking of executed works
• Document Release process after work execution
• Release to service
• Return to operations
• Management of asset restrictions

Our Railfleet software provides a transparent planning and communication platform. It helps fill the gap between the different ECM stakeholders. They are able to synchronize mixed fleet information. There is a lot to gain by automating day-to-day ECM management.   

You can read more about Railfleet here: https://help.railnova.eu/en/articles/101359-what-is-railfleet 

What this means for you

Railnova is the perfect help to leverage ECM-related rights! In short, it reduces the margin of error by giving a thorough oversight. 

This means that there is less room for human error. Managers have direct access to all data, making the information more reliable.

The information is not only reliable but also readily accessible. This makes the process faster and allows to cut costs by avoiding bigger breakdowns. It also allows focusing on processes, helping to make them more efficient.   

Efficiency mostly means saving time but also money. Beyond that, it also helps save everyone’s sanity too! 

Railgenius helps make processes clear and transparent. Everyone knows what they are doing. This means everyone knows where responsibilities lie. Our products give you a better overview of your assets. This means that your actions correspond more closely to the reality of your locomotives.

Case in point

Here are three examples of how Railgenius can help with ECM-related activities 

• Connecting third parties into the fold

Once you start data monitoring, you can’t stop! One of our customers decided to bring science into the fold. They outsourced the analysis of chemical substance samples to a lab.  

We were asked to create a platform within Railgenius for them to communicate with the lab and with their maintenance crew. 

Through the analysis, they were able to double the periods of locomotive use safely. This reduced maintenance costs considerably. But it did not add stress to the communication process. 

https://help.railnova.eu/en/articles/3001910-preventive-maintenance-on-railfleet

• Data-supported decisions and easy communication

We hear this consistently. Seamless communication is key to many different things!

Having all information centralized in one place allows for better data tracking. Improvement possibilities become evident.  

Through Railnova’s Railfleet platform, many of our customers are able to supervise asset management seamlessly. This results in better coordination with their ECM partners in 100% of the cases.

Our customers proceed to use telematics data to reduce maintenance costs. With our platform, they can track usage counters to plan for condition-based maintenance with precision. They can then review their maintenance plans with the data we provide. 

Instead of taking the locomotive in for a revision every month, they can vary the time according to their needs. This can result in locomotives only needing nine check-ups a year, instead of twelve!

https://help.railnova.eu/en/articles/466165-notifying-your-maintainer-others-about-new-corrective-events 

• Non-negligible time-gains

https://help.railnova.eu/en/articles/3011090-digital-defect-reporting-for-drivers-on-railfleet

Through overall accuracy and our APIs flexibility, we ease communication. This reduces delays and loss of key information, all while having actions thoroughly documented. Sprinkle in a little time and effort. This will result in better, more efficient processes.  

We are not talking about 30-minute gains per day, either. Because the time and effort spent on communication are spread out through a team, it can be hard to quantify. We had a client approach us to measure it. 

They had a fleet of forty locomotives. With our Raulnova solutions, they averaged 2 080 hours gained in a year. 

Imagine all you can do with that much time. Imagine the brainpower that is freed and the possibilities this creates. The sky is the limit! 

If you are a fleet manager and would like to know more about how Railnova can help you, reach out to our team!