PPM templates
For the helpdesk teamPPM templates
Section titled “PPM templates”A PPM template (planned-preventive-maintenance) is a saved definition of a recurring estates job — fire-alarm test, monthly, PAT testing, annually, boiler service, six-monthly. Apply a template to a building or asset and a compliance schedule is created with the right cadence and checklist already populated.
What’s on a template
Section titled “What’s on a template”- Name — “Fire alarm test”, “Emergency lighting check”. Sentence case.
- Category — broad grouping for the picker: mechanical, electrical, plumbing, grounds, catering, cleaning, fabric, other.
- Description — one or two lines on what the job covers.
- Default frequency (months) — 1 = monthly, 12 = annually. Schedules inherit this but you can override per-instance.
- Advance warning days — how many days before due you want the due soon warning to fire. Optional; if blank the schedule falls back to the global default (30 days).
- Recommended contractor type — “NICEIC registered electrician”. Surfaces on the schedule’s contractor picker.
- Checklist — the steps the inspector follows. JSON array of strings, ordered.
- Is active — flag. Inactive templates are hidden from the picker but kept.
When to use a template
Section titled “When to use a template”Templates are most useful for jobs that:
- Recur on a fixed schedule (compliance-driven, not reactive).
- Have a standard checklist that doesn’t change much between visits.
- Need a specific contractor type each time.
A one-off boiler replacement isn’t a PPM. It’s a project. Don’t write a template for it.
Editing a template that’s in use
Section titled “Editing a template that’s in use”Changing a template doesn’t retroactively update schedules already created from it. New schedules will pick up the new defaults; existing ones keep the values they were created with. This is intentional — you usually don’t want a frequency change to silently shift everyone’s existing dates around.
Gotchas
Section titled “Gotchas”- The seeded template set ships with the common UK compliance items (PAT, EICR, LOLER, etc.). You shouldn’t need to write many bespoke templates.
- Checklist strings are stored as JSON — keep them short, action-oriented, in order. “Visual inspection of valve seat”, not “Check the valve and write a report on what you find”.