Downtime caused by an employee?

In any case, the simple one is “suspension of work caused by the lack of organizational or technical conditions necessary for the work to be performed, by inevitable force or other circumstances” (Article. 34 of the Labor Code of Ukraine).

Suspension of work may occur due to the fault of the employee (for example, having violated the technological process, which led to equipment failure), the employer (not providing the employee with the necessary materials and components on time), or due to circumstances of inevitable force (a hurricane damaged the power line).

Without going into details, we note that in the second and third cases, downtime is paid at the rate of 2/3 of the average salary or tariff rate (salary) of the employee, in the first case the employee does not receive anything. Moreover, if due to downtime due to the fault of the employee, the employer suffers property damage, the employee may be held liable.

Downtime can drag on for several days, and sometimes months, then the employee can be transferred to another position or even sent on vacation at his own expense.
If the employee does not inform in time about the circumstances due to which downtime can happen, it can be regarded as his fault, because the employer could not timely receive information about the potential failure of the equipment and take measures to prevent it or, if the failure was inevitable, to speedy repair of equipment.

If a simple incident occurred as a result of employee negligence, this can also be interpreted as his fault, since such a situation is not clearly stated in the legislation.
Thus, both the action and inaction of the employee, which led to downtime, even if committed by carelessness, can turn into his fault.

Of course, a commission will be created to investigate the circumstances, and an act should be drawn up based on the results of its work. If the employee is responsible for the downtime, and he does not admit his guilt, he will be able to contact the labor inspectorate, court or prosecutor’s office and challenge the employer’s actions. But it is unlikely that the employee (and the administration of the enterprise) likes this prospect.

The easiest and most effective way for a subject to avoid most of the troubles listed above is to monitor the health of the equipment on which he is working and to report possible problems in a timely manner. And in this invaluable help can be provided to him by the EAM system (if, of course, it is implemented at the enterprise). After all, a well-established automated system for managing fixed assets allows not only to effectively plan preventive maintenance, which can reduce the risk of failure of production assets, but also to carry out predictive (forecast) maintenance of equipment based on data on its current condition.
These data can be obtained using portable devices (tachometers, vibrometers, etc.), analyzers (vibration spectrum analyzers, thermal imagers) and embedded systems (various sensors, including sensors equipped with processors and built-in analytics). Therefore, the probability of untimely notification by the employee of a possible failure is sharply reduced – on the contrary, such messages will be sent in advance to the corresponding services of the enterprise.

Timely detection using the EAM system of even small deviations of operating parameters can allow promptly taking measures to ensure the normal operation of equipment not only in the short, but also in the long term.
Of course, there remains the possibility of downtime due to employee negligence. But no EAM system will help here – any work requires attention and concentration, and if an employee observes these requirements, downtime due to his fault will be eliminated.