Assets & Equipment

The Assets & Equipment module manages every piece of heavy plant, light equipment, and tools in your fleet — from a 50-tonne crawler crane to a vibratory poker. It tracks ownership, location, utilization, maintenance, breakdowns, and chargeback to projects.

Overview

Assets cost real money to own and operate. The module makes that cost visible: which project ate which asset's hours, when the next service is due, why the asset was idle for three weeks, and whether buying vs. renting was the right call.

Screenshot: Equipment register with utilization heat-map and maintenance calendar

Key concepts

Asset. A single piece of equipment — EQ-EXC-001, a Komatsu PC200 excavator. Has serial number, year, owner (owned/rented/leased), purchase cost, depreciation policy.

Allocation. The assignment of an asset to a project for a time window. Allocations drive chargeback.

Utilization. Hours used vs. hours available, captured daily by the operator and validated by the site engineer.

Service plan. Time- or hour-based service schedule (e.g., every 250 engine hours, or every 6 months whichever first).

Breakdown. Unplanned downtime event — time, cause, repair cost, time-to-repair.

Operating cost. Fuel + lube + tyres + insurance + operator wages + depreciation + maintenance, rolled up per hour and per month.

Chargeback rate. The internal hourly rate at which the equipment is charged to projects. Drives project cost reporting.

Step-by-step: register a new asset

1. Assets → New asset.
2. Pick category (excavator, crane, generator, formwork, etc.).
3. Fill in: model, serial, year, ownership, purchase cost, expected useful life.
4. Upload purchase invoice, registration card, insurance certificate.
5. Set the service plan (frequency by time or by hours).
6. Click Activate. The asset is now in the registry.

Step-by-step: allocate to a project

1. From the asset detail, click Allocate.
2. Pick the project, start date, planned end date, chargeback rate.
3. The project's daily timesheet now includes this asset.
4. At allocation end, the asset returns to Available state automatically.

Step-by-step: log daily utilization

1. The operator opens the Daily timesheet on mobile at end of shift.
2. Enters hours run, fuel consumed, any breakdowns.
3. The site engineer verifies and signs.
4. Utilization rolls into the asset dashboard and the project cost report.

Step-by-step: record a breakdown

1. Asset → Breakdowns → New.
2. Record time of failure, cause, downtime hours, repair cost, parts used.
3. Upload photos and supplier invoice.
4. Submit — the asset's status returns to Available on closure.

Common tasks

• See utilization by month: Assets → Utilization dashboard.
• Plan maintenance: Assets → Maintenance calendar shows upcoming services.
• Forecast replacement: Assets → Lifecycle shows assets approaching end-of-life.
• Owned vs. rented comparison: the Decision report quantifies the buy-vs-rent threshold.
• Bulk update insurance: Assets → Bulk → Insurance to update insurance certificates ahead of expiry.

Troubleshooting

• "Asset shows utilization 110%." — Operator logged more hours than the available shift hours. Fix the daily timesheet entry.
• "Service plan didn't trigger an alert." — Service plan needs at least one prior service recorded as the baseline.
• "Chargeback rate showing zero on report." — Allocation's chargeback rate field is empty. Edit the allocation.
• "Breakdown cost is missing from operating cost." — Repair cost only flows once the breakdown is closed.

Permissions reference

Permission	Who needs it
ASSET_VIEW	Asset coordinators, PMs
ASSET_REGISTER	Asset coordinators
ASSET_ALLOCATE	PMs, Plant managers
ASSET_UTILIZATION_LOG	Operators, site engineers
ASSET_BREAKDOWN_RECORD	Plant mechanics
ASSET_RATE_EDIT	Finance

See also: Material Intelligence, Reports.