What the Maintenance Work Order Builder does
This builds a complete maintenance work order in the browser: the fault, the priority, the isolation and permit notes, the parts and labour lines with their costs, the work actually done, and a printable job card with a sign-off. It adds up parts, labour and overhead, and checks that the fields a usable record needs are actually filled in.
Nothing is generated. The words on the job card are the words you typed - no invented fault descriptions, no suggested causes, no AI. The only things the page adds are arithmetic and layout.
It runs entirely in your browser, so a job card for a customer site or a confidential asset never leaves the tab.
How to use it
- Fill in the header: work order number, asset and tag, location, type and priority. The priority guide underneath the selector says what the response expectation is.
- Describe the fault as reported. Write what was wrong, not just a symptom code - this is the field the next technician reads first when the same thing happens again.
- Record the isolation and the permit. If no isolation was needed, say so explicitly; a blank field reads as forgotten rather than as not required.
- Add parts as description, part number, quantity and unit cost, and labour as name, trade, hours and rate, one line each. Totals and overhead follow automatically.
- Write what was done and, where you know it, the root cause. Then print the job card, copy it as Markdown for a ticket, or export the cost lines as CSV.
Reading the results
The cost total is parts plus labour plus other costs, with overhead applied to the sum. It is the cost of the job, not the cost of the failure - downtime is recorded separately and is usually the larger number.
The completeness check is an A2Z convention, not a legal requirement. Required items are the ones without which the record is not findable or defensible later; advisory items are strongly worth having but do not invalidate the card.
Root cause and follow-up are the fields that turn a job card into something useful. A work order that says what was replaced is a receipt; one that says why it failed and what should change is maintenance history.
The downtime figure belongs here because it is the number that feeds availability and MTBF later. Recording it on the card is much easier than reconstructing it from memory at month end.
Worked example: a breakdown on a conveyor
A conveyor drive is tripping on overload twice a shift. The job is raised as P2 - urgent, attend the same shift - against asset CV-101 on Line 2.
The fitter locks off at MCC-2 way 7, proves dead, and works under electrical permit EP-118. Two specific risks are noted: stored energy in the take-up, and the adjacent line still running.
Two idler rollers at 48.50 each and one bearing at 12.25 make 109.25 of parts. Labour is 3.5 hours of mechanical time at 42 and 1.5 hours of electrical at 55: 147.00 plus 82.50, so 229.50 for five hours. With 30 of other costs the subtotal is 368.75, and 10% overhead brings the job to 405.63.
The work done records a seized idler roller, replaced with bearings, belt retensioned and re-tracked, then run up and monitored for twenty minutes. The root cause is water ingress at the wash-down point, and the follow-up is a modification request to extend the guard.
The card records 95 minutes of downtime. On a line making 120 units an hour at 12 margin, that downtime cost about 2,280 - five and a half times the cost of the repair, which is the argument for the guard modification.
Formulas and scoring rules
- Parts total
sum(quantity x unit cost)- Labour total
sum(hours x rate)- Overhead
overhead = (parts + labour + other) x overhead% / 100- Job total
total = parts + labour + other + overheadMoney is displayed to two decimal places; the arithmetic is not rounded until display.- Completeness score
score = required fields present / required fieldsAn A2Z convention for a record that will still make sense in a year, not a legal requirement.
What makes a work order worth writing
Most maintenance systems are full of job cards that say 'repaired' and nothing else. They cost the same to raise as a useful one and are worth nothing afterwards, because they answer no question anybody will later ask: what failed, why, what was fitted, and how long was the plant down.
Four fields carry almost all of the value. The fault as reported, because it is how the next person recognises the same problem. The work done, in enough detail that somebody can repeat it. The part numbers actually fitted, because that is the only reliable bill of materials a machine ever gets. And the downtime, because without it there is no availability figure and no case for doing anything differently.
Root cause is the fifth, and it is the one that changes anything. 'Bearing failed' is a symptom; 'water ingress at the wash-down point' is a cause with a fix attached.
The job card is not the permit
Recording an isolation on a work order is documentation. It is not the isolation, and it is not a permit to work. Those are separate, controlled documents with their own numbering, their own signatures and their own hand-back procedure, and a job card that appears to substitute for them is dangerous.
What the card should carry is the reference: which isolation, which permit, so that the two records tie together afterwards. That is why this page asks for a permit reference rather than offering to produce one.
Limitations: what the result does not prove
- It produces a document from what you type. It is not a permit to work, an isolation certificate, a risk assessment or a method statement, and it does not replace any of them.
- The completeness check is a convention, not compliance. Your site's procedure decides what a work order must contain, and it may require more than this page asks for.
- Costs are a simple sum. Contractor call-out structures, overtime premiums, stock revaluation and capitalisation rules are not modelled.
- There is no storage. Closing the tab loses the card, so export or print anything you need to keep, and paste it into the maintenance system rather than treating this as the system of record.
Privacy: where your data goes
Everything you paste, type or drop is processed in this browser tab. It is not uploaded, logged, stored or sent to analytics. Session recording and tag-manager scripts are switched off on this page.
Standards and sources
- IEC 60300-3-11 - Dependability: reliability centred maintenance - checked 19 Sep 2026
- ISO 22400-2 - Key performance indicators for manufacturing operations management
- IEC 60812 - Failure modes and effects analysis (FMEA and FMECA)
Frequently asked questions
What should a maintenance work order include?
A reference number, the asset, the fault as reported, the priority, how the job was made safe, the work actually done, parts and labour with costs, the downtime caused, and a signature. The fault description and the parts fitted are the fields that make the record worth keeping.
How do I prioritise maintenance work orders?
By consequence, not by who asked loudest. A common four-level scheme is: P1 safety or total stoppage, attend now; P2 urgent, same shift; P3 routine, next planned window; P4 when convenient. Writing the response expectation next to each level is what stops everything becoming a P1.
What is the difference between a work order and a permit to work?
A work order says what job to do and records what was done. A permit to work is a controlled safety document that authorises specific work under specific conditions, with its own signatures and hand-back. Recording a permit number on a work order ties them together; it does not replace the permit.
Should root cause be recorded on the job card?
Yes, when it is known, and marked as unknown when it is not. Root cause is what turns a repair history into an improvement plan, and it is almost impossible to reconstruct later. If it needs investigation, say so in the follow-up field rather than guessing.
How do I calculate the cost of a maintenance job?
Parts at what they cost, labour at hours times rate, plus any other direct costs, with overhead applied if your site does that. What that total will not include is downtime, which is frequently several times larger and is the number that justifies the fix.
Why record downtime on the work order?
Because it is the only place it is known accurately, and it is the input to availability, MTBF and the cost case for any improvement. Reconstructing it from shift logs at month end is guesswork, and guessed downtime is worse than none.
Is my data sent anywhere?
No. The page runs entirely in your browser, and the copy, Markdown and CSV exports are produced locally. That also means nothing is saved: export or print before you close the tab.
Can I use this for a customer-facing job sheet?
Yes - print it or export the Markdown and paste it into your own template. What it cannot do is calculate tax, apply contract rates or serve as an invoice; it records the job, and billing is a separate step.
Last reviewed by the A2Z.Tools team against the sources listed above.
