Every facility manager knows the temptation of breakdown maintenance: do nothing until something fails, then fix it. It keeps this month's bill low and asks nothing of anyone until the equipment forces the issue. The problem is that the bill you avoid today arrives later, larger, and at the worst possible time.

The two approaches

Breakdown (reactive) maintenance runs equipment until it fails, then repairs or replaces it. Preventive (planned) maintenance services equipment on a calendar built around manufacturer intervals and actual running hours, before failure occurs.

Why reactive costs more over time

The monthly saving from skipping preventive work is real but small. The costs it creates are larger and less visible:

  • Emergency premiums. Unplanned repairs mean call-out charges, expedited parts and overtime labour — routinely several times the cost of the same work planned.
  • Collateral damage. A failed component often takes others with it. A neglected bearing can cost a motor; a blocked drain can cost a false ceiling.
  • Shortened asset life. Equipment run without service reaches the end of its usable life years early, pulling forward large capital replacement you had already paid to defer.
  • Downtime and disruption. A chiller that fails in peak summer or a lift out of service in a tower is not just a repair bill — it is a business and reputation cost.

The five-year view

Looked at one month at a time, reactive maintenance wins almost every month — until the month it loses badly. Looked at across an asset's five-year life, the pattern reverses: planned maintenance carries a steady, predictable cost and keeps assets reaching their designed life, while reactive maintenance runs cheap then spikes, and quietly consumes capital budget through early replacement. The discipline is not about spending more; it is about converting large, random costs into small, scheduled ones.

How to make the shift

  • Build an asset register. You cannot maintain what you have not catalogued. Record every asset, its condition and its service requirement.
  • Plan against real intervals. Use manufacturer guidance and running hours, not guesswork.
  • Track breakdown history. Repeated failures on one asset are data — they tell you what to replace before it fails again.
  • Report closure and pending items. A maintenance report should show preventive tasks completed, breakdowns attended, closure times and what remains open.

The takeaway

Breakdown maintenance is not a strategy; it is the absence of one. The buildings that stay at handover standard in year three are the ones where maintenance runs on a calendar, not on failure.