Cost of Unplanned Downtime of a Forklift

Have you ever considered the cost of unplanned downtime of a forklift? We can talk about multiple, or an entire fleet, however, just picking on a particular forklift can give you an idea of what it is for one, then multiply it by the number of forklifts in your facility or facilities. To begin, let’s take a look at the results of a study on downtime.

Cost of Unplanned Downtime of a Forklift

According to Aberdeen Research, 82% of facilities experienced unplanned downtime over a course of three years. They uncovered that it can cost a company as much as $260k per hour. When the forklift is down, the facility is not experiencing any value such as fulfilling orders, taking product from the production line and more. However, the study did point out that the cost of overhead operations continues to add up. That results in a direct loss to the bottom line.

The Research study also concluded that due to the unplanned downtime of a forklift, that it has encouraged management to visit or revisit going digital.

• Of those that experienced unplanned downtime, in the three year timeframe, the average downtime was four hours, and cost on average $2M.
• Customers lose trust. When that occurs more than once, they tend to find a new partner that has their facilities working operationally well. It stated that “37 percent lost production time on a critical asset, and 29 percent were unable to service or support specific equipment or assets.”

A surprising 12% said that they believe their facility is where they need to be, due to the digital transformation that they made.

Digital Transformation

With such startling numbers in the survey results, evaluating an AI based forklift safety system may be what is necessary to keep the production going strong in your facility. The digital and AI on the SIERA AI forklift safety system works together.

When the forklift driver gets on the forklift and enters the correct credentials, the first thing that will happen is that the digital forklift checklist comes up. The forklift will not start until the forklift passes inspection. This is the first step in keeping the forklift running at maximum uptime.

However, lets remember that all forklift operators are trying to get done with this step quickly. So just like ‘pencil whipping’, there is ‘digital whipping’. As a result, SIERA AI has implemented randomization. What means, that you can take any part of the digital forklift checklist and have the questions randomized. Now the driver doesn’t know which question will come up first.

But let’s stay one ahead. You have the ability to change the questions around too. In the telemetry Dashboard, you can change up a question, keep the same meaning, and now they need to watch when this may happen. A recommended once per quarter should be enough. Now you’ll get accuracy in your answers which is vital for keeping your forklift uptime at peak levels.

Marry Digital with AI

Now that you have a handle on the digital part, here are a few areas that you can ensure ultimate safety on the forklift with AI.

• Pedestrian Detect
• Object Detection (yes, these are separate)
• Impact Detection
• Forklift Access Control

When these are combined with the digital forklift checklist, you can be sure that your cost of unplanned downtime of a forklift will be zero or very close to it. Contact us today to begin your journey to zero.

Contact Us!

Contact us today at sales@siera.ai or call us at (512) 817 0702.