Forklifts, like everything else, get worn and torn over time – they need occasional TLC. Without proper care, they will break down more quickly and more easily. They can even become safety hazards causing injury and death! Neglected forklifts cost your business time, money, and manpower. The way to avoid all that is to make sure your forklifts are scheduled for routine maintenance checks.

Performing regular maintenance on your fleet’s forklifts is a great way to protect your investment and your business. It will produce long-term benefits that your operators and your bottom line will thank you for.

Here are the 5 reasons why keeping your forklifts in tip-top condition is beneficial to your business:

1. Increased Productivity and Service Life

Performing regularly scheduled maintenance on your forklifts is a proactive way to increase their expected service life. Longer uptime in operation provides increased productivity out of your forklift fleet. And more productivity means a higher return on investment (ROI). Also, when your fleet’s forklifts have a longer service life, you will replace them less often, saving you thousands.

2. Eliminate Expensive Unexpected Repairs

When your fleet is not regularly inspected and maintained, breakdown is more likely to occur. Such downtime can cost hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars per minute. By regularly maintaining your fleet, you can find problems and fix them before they turn into a costly repair. Doing so also decreases the risk of failures and emergency repairs. In other words, well-maintained forklifts reduce downtime. And this saves you money!

3. Keep Your Forklifts Within Warranty

Each forklift has a recommended maintenance schedule set forth by the original equipment manufacturer (OEM). This recommended maintenance schedule is to help your fleet stay within the OEM’s warranty. Whether you are a dealer or an end-user, you are held to the same OEM standard to register your forklifts and keep warranties up to date. The maintenance schedule differs depending on several factors such as fuel type, type of operation, hours of usage. For the specific forklifts in your fleet, please refer to the Operator’s Manual for the appropriate service intervals.

4. Higher Resale Value

Like with cars, a forklift’s value depreciates over time because of wear and tear. But if you are diligent about maintenance and keep your fleet’s forklifts compliant with the OEM warranty, the value doesn’t depreciate as quickly. This means you will be able to recover more of your initial investment when you sell or trade in your forklift(s).

5. Safety, Safety, Safety

At the end of the day, everything we do has to be about safety. Every workplace has a responsibility to its employees to keep them safe. By simply maintaining your forklifts, you can identify potential safety issues before they become serious safety hazards. Doing so can keep the forklifts your employees use daily in the best working condition. Learn more about how to optimize forklift safety at your workplace here.

Here at DIVAC, we pride ourselves in providing world-class support to our dealers and end-users. Our product service department currently offers virtual service training to our dealers and their service technicians. You can get your forklift maintenance performed by a trained and certified service technician at any of our 225 dealer locations. Additionally, any serious issues found during your maintenance visit are fed into our live worldwide service feedback loop so that issues resolved quickly and efficiently. If you have any questions regarding our warranty or about our dealer service technician training, please contact your local dealer.