Are you among the organizations that still use Excel to record, manage, and track Calibration results?

You might have to face the following challenges with the traditional approach:

• Errors during the data entry process
• Irregular Calibrations
• Risk of Non-Compliance Due to Traceability
• Transfers and Collaboration Issues

For this reason, you need a dedicated Calibration Management Software solution. The new-age solutions are designed to meet ever-growing and changing business requirements.

An effective solution makes the Calibration Management process much simpler. The software provides automated management and storage of all equipment details and calibration-related data. It involves scheduling calibration activities, analyzing and optimizing calibration frequencies, generating reports, certificates, and labels which help reduce errors and costs while improving overall organizational performance.

Related Articles: Calibration Management Software: Benefits of Being Cloud-Based

Before discussing equipment calibration management software, the features, and the benefits, it is important to understand the typical calibration management tasks businesses have to perform. In general, a calibrating process involves the following steps:

1. Identify and Categorize

In the first step, businesses should list all their equipment and measurement devices. Further, they can be categorized as critical and non-critical based on their calibration range and tolerance limit.

Also, the current calibration status should be identified for all the listed equipment.

2. Train Your Staff

You must keep your calibration team prepared. In addition, they must be trained on how to use the tools and perform the calibration tasks accordingly.

3. Fix Calibration Schedules

Calibrations are usually performed as follows:

• During and after a large-scale measuring project
• After the equipment stops functioning well
• As necessary for the job at hand
• As regularly as possible, monthly, quarterly, bi-annually, or annually

You must decide on the calibration schedules for different equipment, based on their criticality in the functions.

4. Execute Calibration Activities

The calibration staff is then responsible for performing the calibrations and ensuring all safety procedures are followed.

5. Document the Calibration Records

It is important to record and document the calibration process and process results regularly. Maintaining a calibration record is necessary to accurately track activities.

6. Analyze the Calibration Records

Equipment managers will then analyze the data collected from the documented calibration results to determine whether any corrective measures need to be taken.

Calibration Management Software: What Is the Need?

Businesses require more equipment as they grow. Consequently, increases in business equipment also increase manual documentation.

One recent survey found that equipment managers spend almost half of their time documenting and processing paperwork. Instead, they can use this time to do something more productive.

The calibration management software (CMS) is a computer program used to plan and track equipment calibrations. It ensures that calibrating, adjusting, or replacing equipment are done on a timely basis by maintaining schedules, keeping track of history, and communicating with concerned authorities.

Monitoring equipment calibration helps managers ensure that processing equipment works at its best. To accomplish this, all moving parts are greased and all consumable products are replaced ahead of time. Moreover, equipment managers can automate planning to decrease management and administrative workloads.

Calibration Management Software: Core Features

You might not know where to begin when deciding on the right software types for your organization. Start it by taking your business goals and objectives are the first thing to consider. After that, you would want to create a strategy for achieving those goals. You should remember one thing that calibration requirements for different businesses vary.

Calibration Management Software: Seven Key Benefits

Businesses can benefit from calibration management software in a variety of ways. The benefits of this include reduced maintenance costs, higher efficiency, and greater control over equipment maintenance. Below is a list of some of the most prominent advantages of a calibration management solution.

1. Streamlined and Automated Workflows

A cloud-based CMS tool can simplify administrative and managerial tasks. It streamlines workflow and aids calibration managers in keeping track of calibration intervals. The goal of these reports is to make an informed and qualified recommendation. In addition, the software’s ‘Audit Trail’ function allows equipment engineers to optimize calibration intervals.

In addition, automated and validated processes replace manual procedures. Equipment managers no longer invest time in paperwork. Instead, engineers are guided through the calibration process by a well-defined workflow. It ensures consistent best practices for the equipment calibration process.

2. Increased efficiency

By streamlining and automating the whole calibration process, plant efficiency is also improved. Automation allows businesses to streamline labor-intensive calibration procedures by replacing manual processes. Moreover, engineers can spend the time saved on strategic analysis or other core-business tasks.

3. Lowered Costs

Businesses can save money by using software for calibration management. It is the result of eliminating paper documentation procedures. Moreover, Calibration Management Solutions are more accurate, faster, and easier to use, so you can use them to track the previous trends and make informed decisions to optimize equipment calibration schedules and save costs.

4. Effective performance management

By monitoring the Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), equipment managers can have a real-time view of the operations while tracking the Key Performance Indicators in real-time. As a result, an organization can analyze how effectively its installed equipment and resources are performing.

5. Standardization and Compliance

Calibration records must meet the demands of regulatory organizations and industry standards, like the FDA and ISO. A calibration management software comes with handy functions that help in meeting these requirements. Also, the FDA and ISO recommend a CMS solution to track compliance with calibration timeliness.

6. Retain Calibration Records and Historical Data

Now that the planned procedures and calibration strategies are in place. This software keeps track of all calibration assets automatically. The program also maintains calibration database information for devices, and it automatically notifies the user when a calibration is due. Also, the software can generate automated reports and centralize calibration data.

7. Increase Lifetime of equipment

It takes a lot of time and effort to plan and keep track of equipment maintenance. Therefore, longevity is an important factor, both in time and money. By automating a calibration and maintenance due date calculation, a cloud-based CMS solution can help keep track of maintenance intervals.

The calibration management software allows equipment managers to set a calibration frequency and define how to calculate the due dat. Your business will also save time and money because your equipment will be calibrated and maintained on time, decreasing downtime.

Related Articles: How Equipment Calibration Contributes to Quality Management

Calibration Management Software: How to Implement It

With a Calibration Management software in hand, you will want to incorporate it into your business in a way that fully benefits your company. The software needs to be able to fit seamlessly into your existing workflows for a successful implementation. The following are some key tips for implementing a calibration management solution.

• Outline your objectives

Identifying business goals and identifying calibration requirements is essential before adopting a cloud-based CMS solution. First, you should clearly define objectives, whatever they might be. Following this, choose the calibration management solution that suits your needs. Software implementation cannot be successful without clearly defined goals.

• Analyze Current State of Equipment

An organization’s self-assessment helps them determine its current state and develop an improvement strategy. An evaluation provides information to businesses on how much, what kind, and what kind of equipment they own, and the condition of that equipment. By analyzing the company’s current situation, you can also use this as a benchmark for judging future performance following the implementation of the software.

• Specify the calibration requirements

Specifying your calibration requirements is essential to deploying a calibration management system. It is crucial to know how much and what types of equipment you own and require when selecting cloud-based CMS solutions for your organization.

• Selecting the Right Software

Then, after defining your goals and calibration needs, you can find the software that best helps you meet those requirements and achieve your goals.

• Follow-up, review, and update

When you deploy a calibration management solution, you need to keep track of some key performance indicators to measure its success.

Regularly capturing and analyzing asset data indicates whether the system is performing as planned. To reduce downtime, you can, for example, generate reports regarding your equipment’s maintenance schedules and life cycles. Moreover, you can collect regular feedback and generate reports about the performance of your team. Finally, you can use this information to update calibration management programs to be as efficient as possible.

Conclusion

A calibration management system is beneficial for all manufacturing environments, regardless of their size and sector. With a dedicated cloud-based CMS, you can improve quality, increase productivity, and reduce costs associated with the calibration process. By doing this, businesses can save time and money and increase their productivity.

Click here for more details about Qualityze Calibration Management Software.

Qualityze Calibration Management Software is a cloud-based CMS Solution that allows companies worldwide to manage equipment and tools calibrations, conduct maintenance events, and cut costs. We offer a free demo to demonstrate product features and insights.

If you want to learn more about Qualityze products, please contact our customer success team directly at +1-877-207-8616 or email us at [email protected], and we will be there for you.

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