More than a third of production press users say downtime is their biggest business headache, a survey carried out by Ricoh has revealed.
The poll, which was run at this year's Digital Print World exhibition, showed 39% of respondents put "maintaining availability" at the top of their list of woes.
Danwood graphics and production systems division managing director Gerry Mulvaney agreed that downtime was an issue and said his company offered a 90% working week uptime service level agreement (SLA) in its support provisions.
He told printweek.com that it was in both his and his company's interests to keep these presses running.
"On average, our machine uptimes are in mid-90%," he said. "There are penalties built into the SLA if we fail to meet the targets. We have put this in place to ensure that customers share our confidence in the equipment."
Ricoh UK marketing director Chas Moloney said he was not surprised at reliability issues being at the top of the heap and claimed that the measures his company takes can reduce downtime by a fifth.
"We provide mission critical-level support to our customers through, for example, our customer replaceable parts service. Parts are stored on site and changed as soon as needed by the customer with support form Ricoh.
"There is no packaging or posting of used parts, to ensure customer convenience engineers visit the site to repair or replace stock – boosting customer productivity," he said.
Mulvaney said that downtime issues are often more a problem with mismatching equipment to the task rather than an inherent problem with unreliability.
"The problems occur when machines are purchased or used for volumes or applications they were not designed for. There are many reasons for this, sometimes it is the salesman's fault for incorrect specification or sometimes users buy to a price or their needs change and they try to use inappropriate equipment for the application," he said.
Mulvaney added: "There is a good reason why the Konica Minolta engine is more expensive that the Sharp, for example, and trying to produce 700,000 to 800,000 mono prints a month on the Sharp would make it seem 'unreliable', when in fact is not designed for that volume."
Mulvaney also cited skill gaps as being a stumbling block, particularly with colour machines, where the applications involved are often more sophisticated. He said that the pressures of a busy print room could mean supplier provided training can get sidelined, leading to problems further down the line.
However, he added that despite these pressures, many printers and CRDs recognise the value of adding in substantial support packages when they buy a production press.
"Experienced users realise that regular equipment maintenance and staff training will pay dividends in terms of reliability, productivity and up-time. Can you imagine what the M1 motorway would look like, if it was populated with learner drivers and clapped out unserviced bangers? There would be precious little travelling being done."
Among the other headaches cited by those polled at the exhibition, the pressure to be green was the second biggest problem at 14%. Issues such as processing out-of-hours jobs, boosting infrastructure capacity, managing workflows and increasing security also rated among the key concerns.
The survey polled 100 people at this year's Digital Print World, 16 to 18 October at London's Earl's Court 2
The poll, which was run at this year's Digital Print World exhibition, showed 39% of respondents put "maintaining availability" at the top of their list of woes.
Danwood graphics and production systems division managing director Gerry Mulvaney agreed that downtime was an issue and said his company offered a 90% working week uptime service level agreement (SLA) in its support provisions.
He told printweek.com that it was in both his and his company's interests to keep these presses running.
"On average, our machine uptimes are in mid-90%," he said. "There are penalties built into the SLA if we fail to meet the targets. We have put this in place to ensure that customers share our confidence in the equipment."
Ricoh UK marketing director Chas Moloney said he was not surprised at reliability issues being at the top of the heap and claimed that the measures his company takes can reduce downtime by a fifth.
"We provide mission critical-level support to our customers through, for example, our customer replaceable parts service. Parts are stored on site and changed as soon as needed by the customer with support form Ricoh.
"There is no packaging or posting of used parts, to ensure customer convenience engineers visit the site to repair or replace stock – boosting customer productivity," he said.
Mulvaney said that downtime issues are often more a problem with mismatching equipment to the task rather than an inherent problem with unreliability.
"The problems occur when machines are purchased or used for volumes or applications they were not designed for. There are many reasons for this, sometimes it is the salesman's fault for incorrect specification or sometimes users buy to a price or their needs change and they try to use inappropriate equipment for the application," he said.
Mulvaney added: "There is a good reason why the Konica Minolta engine is more expensive that the Sharp, for example, and trying to produce 700,000 to 800,000 mono prints a month on the Sharp would make it seem 'unreliable', when in fact is not designed for that volume."
Mulvaney also cited skill gaps as being a stumbling block, particularly with colour machines, where the applications involved are often more sophisticated. He said that the pressures of a busy print room could mean supplier provided training can get sidelined, leading to problems further down the line.
However, he added that despite these pressures, many printers and CRDs recognise the value of adding in substantial support packages when they buy a production press.
"Experienced users realise that regular equipment maintenance and staff training will pay dividends in terms of reliability, productivity and up-time. Can you imagine what the M1 motorway would look like, if it was populated with learner drivers and clapped out unserviced bangers? There would be precious little travelling being done."
Among the other headaches cited by those polled at the exhibition, the pressure to be green was the second biggest problem at 14%. Issues such as processing out-of-hours jobs, boosting infrastructure capacity, managing workflows and increasing security also rated among the key concerns.
The survey polled 100 people at this year's Digital Print World, 16 to 18 October at London's Earl's Court 2
Source: printweek
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