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Getting the most out of your maintenance Regular maintenance is crucial to the reliability of your vital UPS systems, but Chris Cutler of Riello UPS warns not all maintenance contracts are created equally and offers some top tips to ensure you get the best possible coverage.
ninterruptible power supplies (UPS) provide invaluable peace of mind that if there’s any disruption to the mains electricity, your vital equipment has the emergency backup needed to keep on running. Whether it’s a mission-critical setting, such as a data centre or hospital, or protecting IT equipment and devices in home offices up and down the country, a UPS is proven to be the best defence against unplanned downtime. But a UPS is a sophisticated piece of machinery in its own right, costing anywhere from a few hundred pounds for a small, plug-and-play domestic unit to tens or even hundreds of thousands of pounds for a larger commercial installation. To get the most out of such a significant investment you need to look after it. How well maintained a UPS is has a big impact on its reliability, performance and eventual lifespan. But wear and tear over time is inevitable. Parts and components will need replacing. And no piece of electrical equipment is ever infallible – at some point, your UPS is likely to break down or malfunction.
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30 Electrical Review | January / February 2022
Why maintenance matters New UPS systems are covered by warranties. In fact, much of Riello UPS’s range comes with an extended five-year warranty as standard. But even with a warranty, you’ll only get a ‘best endeavour’ response if something goes wrong. You could still be waiting a while for things to get fixed. That’s why many organisations opt for the safety net of an ongoing maintenance plan. A maintenance agreement sets out the emergency response time it’ll take for engineers to attend the site when something goes wrong. It will cover whether consumables like capacitors and fans are included and if you’ll have to pay for parts and labour. It’ll also include the provision for at least one service visit a year. These Preventive Maintenance Visits (PMV) are the equivalent of an annual service on your car or boiler. Engineers will identify any parts that might need replacing, carry out little performance tweaks, and install the latest software updates. Such a proactive approach to UPS maintenance not only reduces your risk of experiencing a costly failure. It also ensures your UPS runs