Procurement Issues In Our FM Organisation

What a whirlwind my first 6 months at Thermatic have been!

We’ve had COVID problems, microchip shortages, supply chain delays, the list goes on just like challenges in any business. Everyone talks about effective prioritization, but what happens when everything goes wrong at once?

I’m Becky, the Procurement Manager here at Thermatic Technical FM, and I’m going to talk about some of the ways that we have successfully navigated our way through these problems, and a couple of ways we are mitigating the risk for the future.

Procurement VS COVID

When I joined Thermatic back in March, we were fairly sure that this year would be simpler with the easing of lockdown, but of course as our teams started to return to the office and go to gigs/events, COVID picked them off one by one, and a lot of our employees had to return home to isolate for one reason or another.

Luckily for Thermatic, the business was quick to utilize remote working software and give employees the power to work effectively from home.

Procurement had a part to play in this, we worked with our IT team and partnered with a couple of tech suppliers to negotiate some bulk discounts on laptops and headsets. We also took the opportunity to refurbish our office, giving our old office chairs a new lease of life by passing them on FOC to employees so they could furnish their home offices.

Procurement VS Microchip Shortages

A big problem for lots of businesses out there right now, the manufacturing of semiconductors in China and the US has been delayed, the results of which have caused many industries a lot of pain. Vehicles, computers, refrigerators, tumble dryers…you name it! It’s amazing how a small piece of tech can have such a huge impact on the economy.

For Thermatic this resulted in a shortage of vans, a pretty core component of a business which runs a fleet of over 100 vehicles across the UK!

We enjoyed a growing number in recruitment of engineers this year, which means new vans were required with very short notice. Thankfully I had worked on forming a strategic alliance with our fleet supplier when I first joined the business. I offered to give them almost 90% of our fleet on hire, if they agreed to fixed rates and tagged up around 50 vans in advance so we could call them off when needed.

This alliance has proven to be one of the best things we could have done, we have had very little issue with sourcing vehicles, and our supplier does their best to support us with last minute requirements as they view us as an important, committed customer.

Procurement VS Supply Chain Delays

For some, it was Nando’s running out of chicken. For others, it was Maccies not having milkshakes. For me, it was on a trip to Alton Towers when I saw the hotdog stand was shut ‘due to supply issues’.

For Thermatic, I have seen shortages in absolutely everything. Our branded merchandise, our clothing, the vans, the industrial equipment, steel parts, the weekly office groceries, everything!

The reason? Brexit, COVID, long standing economic issues…the list goes on.

So how do I, a procurement professional in 2021, find a way to solve all of these MASSIVE supply issues?

Well, you can mitigate some of it with stock holding where possible. Our suppliers have agreed to hold the engineer uniforms at their sites for us so we can call off when we need them. We invested in a storage unit down south where we can keep equipment with longer lead times in stock for emergencies. Our engineers keep a certain amount of equipment in their vans for first-time fixes to avoid long wait times.

When it comes to the bigger ticket items though, sometimes the best thing you can do is manage expectations. Ultimately, everyone else is in the same position as you so you may as well be honest with customers and tell them how it is.

I have spent a lot of time the last few months building relationships with our suppliers and making sure they understand how important communication is to us. If the supplier just tells me if there is a delay, even if they don’t have an ETA, this could be enough to help us spring into action.

Swap the engineer onto another job, cancel the hired access machinery without a penalty, find a way to make it right with the customer, look for alternative parts if possible…ultimately saving a lot of money and the customer’s trust.

 

Procurement is not an easy job at the moment, I frequently rely on our suppliers to tell me what I should be watchful of. I try to be proactive with our risk management and put in contingencies, but with such a fragile economy all we can do is learn to adapt to change as best we can and support each other.

Written by Rebecca Jackson – Procurement Manager TTFM