How to Create or Fix Your Built Asset Register

James Weber: So formally, hi everyone. Thanks for joining us today to learn how to create or fix a Built Asset Register. I'm James Weber and I work in the marketing team with SFG20. I'm joined today by an SFG20 expert Davey Clark, who will be helping us understand how to create or fix that pesky built asset register.

So David works in the professional services team at SFG20 helping our clients understand correct and work with their asset data. So the structure of this webinar is as follows. First, we will talk you through how to create or fix an asset register. Then Davey's going to give you a practical demonstration of what an asset register looks like and how it works.

We'll also have a Q&A at the end of the session. So feel free to put questions in the Q&A tab as we go. You can see it on the bottom of your screen. It's just sort of to the right there with a little question mark icon. If there are any questions we don't have time to answer, you'll receive a response by email.

And just so you know, the webinar is being recorded, so if there's any information you'd like to go back and rewatch, you will be able to. So if we flick to the next slide. So what is a built asset register? A built asset register provides a complete record of all assets within a building. It can take many forms.

It can be held within a facilities management software system, often in CAFM or MS Excel file format. Built asset registers typically form parts of a building owner's manual or an operations manual, or an operations and maintenance manual, also known as an O&M manual. There is no statutory requirement or legal requirement for this manual, but it should form a legal obligation within the contracts to construct a building.

Ideally, the asset register is passed across to the operations and maintenance team after handover by the building owner, but this does not always happen, which leads to the reason why we are all here today.

Most asset data is incomplete and much of it is missing, whether it's lost during the handover process, passed across ineffectively or just filed away somewhere and forgotten. The result is always the same. Generally, an asset register that's 80% complete is considered good in FM. That makes working with asset registers frustrating at best and impossible at worst.

In fact, 93% of FM professionals admitted that they'd had a frustrating experience working with asset registers at a recent SFG20 poll. So what are the consequences of poor asset data? Put simply, poor asset data makes it hard to maintain your assets. Lack of asset data could affect you in a variety of ways, but here are a few examples.

You might struggle to understand what assets you have, where they might be located, or how old they are. If you can't maintain your assets, you're exposing yourself to serious legal, commercial, and contractual risk. These can result in serious repercussions that can and do land individuals in court or prison, expose companies to regulatory fines and damage reputations.

So you really want to try and avoid these risks. Even if we just set aside the risk for a moment, think about the cost. As you may be aware, the cost of maintenance across the course of a building's working lifespan is far higher than the initial cost of construction. If you are maintaining assets ineffectively or not at all because you don't have good asset data, you're setting yourself up for major long-term costs and operational downtime.

These costs are incurred where assets require repair or replacement more frequently. Inefficient assets often consume more energy as well, making it harder for you to reduce your carbon footprint and meet your energy saving goals.

So if you know anything about SFG20, then you know that we are the industry standard for building maintenance. SFG20 created and maintains a library of more than 1500 asset specific maintenance schedules that align with the latest legislation, regulations, standards, and codes of best practice.

Each schedule is made up of multiple asset specific tasks that tell you what to do, when to do it, how long it should take, and the skillset required. SFG20 essentially supplies you with compliant PPM that also helps you secure and save time and money. In some cases, this adds up to millions of pounds.

The time and cost savings aren't the focus of today's webinar, but if you would like to know more, please vote in the poll that will pop up on screen in a second, and we'll send you further resources after the webinar on how that's possible.

Davey Clark: So I'll just give you a little bit of time to vote. I'll give you 20 more seconds. Let's see. That's trickling up.

Okay. I think we can end that poll.

James Weber: Okay, then let's continue talking about why SFG20 is helping you with your asset data. Some of our customers were experiencing a problem we hadn't anticipated. They loved the SFG20 library, but their asset data was so poor that they were struggling to actually apply SFG20 content to it. This meant that they were failing to create a practical maintenance strategy that would actually benefit their estate.

We realised we needed to take a step back and help these customers create a workable asset register. That's part of the reason why SFG20's Professional Services team was created. SFG20 experts like Davey here work with you to correct your asset register, which gives you the foundation on which to build a workable maintenance strategy.

So that's what today's webinar is all about. Davey is going to take you through some practical steps to create or fix your asset register that you can action in your operation.

Davey Clark: Thanks, James. Now the first thing you need to know is that creating or fixing a built asset register are very similar processes. The only major difference is that creating an asset register from scratch will require an asset capture survey. An asset capture survey means going through your estate and physically locating and identifying every asset you have.

You can do this yourself or hire an asset survey company to do it for you. Easiest way to think about what data you need to collect is to consider what questions you need to answer when the execution team or the board ask you about the estate. Some examples: are we compliant? Can we make the estate more energy efficient, or how can we reduce the operational costs of running the estate?

To answer these common questions, we need to collect information shown on screen for each asset. Now that you're clearer on your built asset register's data structure, you need to identify the asset categories and subcategories that are relevant to your organisation. Some examples, again, are shown on screen.

You should also create a simple classification system to make it easier to find assets within your register. You may wish to group assets together in systems such as building, mechanical and electrical as shown here. Within these systems, you can group assets into components and then into sub components.

You should establish unique asset codes too. This will help you find or track individual assets quickly and easily.

This is a very minimal example of an asset register. As you can see, there is potentially a lot of information held here, from what the asset actually is, an asset type. In this case, it could be a hydraulic lift or an electric traction lift. Then we have the SFG20 schedule code. This is the reference number we use to identify it within our system, NRM and Uniclass codes. These can be used to map the asset across other systems. This can help identify what an asset is. NRM three is an order of cost estimation and planning used within the facilities management industry.

Uniclass is a classification system for all sectors of construction. A typical asset register may not necessarily have all these populated. Next, we cover the location and system the asset is part of, where applicable.

Next we cover location in more detail. It can be a great advantage in knowing exactly where in the building an asset is situated.

And then we have some manufacturer's information, including their brand name, model information, serial number, where you have this information. Tag IDs, as we have labelled it here, is an essential way of numbering your assets so as to keep track of every individual item. It's also important to record age, value, condition and the last service date. This will assist in when to carry out overall maintenance and when it is time to replace items. And finally, we have a comment box for any other useful information.

James Weber: All right. Thanks for that, Davey. Now before we move on to the Q&A, I just wanted to say yes, we will share the slide decks for that. I appreciate there is a fair amount of textual information going across. But there's also something else I need to address before we go into the Q&A.

So, you know, like, I'm not gonna lie, building or fixing an asset register is no small task. It might be feasible for those of you with smaller estates, but if you have thousands or tens of thousands of assets, it's going to be a tough ask. So, you know, if you sat through this thinking, you know, oh my goodness, how am I ever supposed to do this?

Like, don't worry, we can help you. So Davey and other members of the professional services team can help you make sense of your asset information, as well as help you improve an asset register if you have existing data. The other big advantage of working with SFG20's Professional Services team directly is that once we've helped you to improve your asset data, we can help you assimilate that data into Facilities-iQ.

Facilities-iQ is SFG20's software solution, and it's how you access the SFG20 standard. This means that by working with us directly, not only will you get a workable asset register, but also a workable maintenance strategy. You'll get asset specific PPM that you can schedule yourself or schedule in your CAFM via our integration.

Having access to this information allows you to easily create precise specifications for tender or rapidly mobilise contracts. A major competitive advantage when creating or bidding on a tender. Now, as I mentioned previously, access to SFG20 does secure and save a lot of time and money. This is because the SFG20 standard helps you maximise asset lifespan, minimise repair costs, hit energy saving targets, and reduce CO2 emissions.

It can easily save you hundreds of man hours per year in PPM creation and compliance benchmarking. It can help you forecast task timings and headcount requirements, reduce unplanned downtime, and much more. All this saves you a ton of money. I've heard as much as £2 million from an NHS client. I actually had a customer from Saudi Arabia tell me last week that they wouldn't even use SFG20 if it didn't provide such good return on investment.

Because in Saudi Arabia, they aren't held to the same compliance standards as the UK. I also had a customer tell me that the standard is incredibly useful in the public sector as well because it helps you to secure maintenance revenue. And, you know, they were able to secure an additional £1 million to their budget by using the SFG20 standard to justify what they were legally required to maintain.

So if any of that sounds good to you, please vote in the following poll and you'll be contacted by an SFG20 expert accordingly. So if you'd like to consult with us about your asset data and learn more about how SFG20 can benefit you, please select the first option. If you only want help with fixing your asset data, vote for option two.

If you just want to learn more about SFG20, it's option three. So I'll give you all a little bit of time to vote on that and then we'll move on to the Q&A.

Davey Clark: And, yes...

James Weber: Ash, you will all receive the recording by email, but don't worry about that.

All right, so we'll leave the poll open, but I'm going to move on to the Q&A now. So if you've been making use of the Q&A function, we will answer your question, presuming we have enough time. So I've also got a couple of pre-prepared questions here that I'm going to kick off with Davey, and then we'll pick out, then Davey will pick out your questions from the Q&A tab.

So I guess Davey, we can start with, you know, what are the common pitfalls that you tend to see with asset registers?

Davey Clark: The most common would be incomplete data. For example, if an asset's described simply as a boiler, when it maybe should be an atmospheric condensing boiler, that type of thing.

James Weber: So, you know, you're talking about specificity of data there.

Davey Clark: Yes.

James Weber: Yeah, that makes sense. I mean, I do remember we came across something like this where someone had labelled an asset as carbon dioxide, which, you know, could mean a variety of different things. So getting that data in and being as you know, precise as you can, definitely helps. So the second question we have was what information do you typically see organisations lack or lose?

Davey Clark: Over time with different staff assigned to look after data, asset replacements or asset updates can easily be missed. This is more typical.

James Weber: Oh. So we just lose that every time something's replaced. Ah, okay. Fair enough. So then what guidance do you generally give to companies looking to improve their asset data?

Davey Clark: Ensure to keep accurate, detailed information on the asset and ensure it's kept up to date is the best advice.

James Weber: Yeah, fair enough. So what would you say then is the most important cultural shift that companies have to embrace to have that good asset data?

Davey Clark: Again, communication. The importance of correct asset data is key here.

James Weber: Yeah. Okay, so let's have a look through some of the Q&A. I think we've got about eight questions in there. So Davey, do you want to just click on that tab and then choose a question from there?

Oh, well for the anonymous attendee that's asked, can we download the webinar? Yes. Everything will be emailed to you afterwards.

Davey Clark: So there's one here. Is an asset survey company required? Could I ask my service provider to execute a survey when they are awarded the contract? You'll probably find most asset survey companies are specialists, and a lot of FM companies may not offer this service unfortunately.

James Weber: And just to add to what Davey said, that's also something we can potentially help you with.

Davey Clark: Here's another one, asking about keeping only maintainable assets or entire assets in the list. It's best practice to have all your assets on your asset register, whether they're maintainable or replaceable. That shouldn't really come into it. It's a good way of monitoring costs, efficiencies, et cetera.

Sorry. Every time I'm reading a question, the chat seems to pop up. Want to scroll back to the beginning? Yeah, there's a lot in here.

Any questions we don't answer today, we will be answering via email anyway, so don't worry if I don't get to your particular question.

There's a very interesting one on the AI role in asset registering and data analysis. We are developing tools within our system whereby we look at your asset data and we use an AI tool to map that to the SFG20 schedules that are more specifically aligned to your data. So AI is definitely playing a big part and will be developed more and more as we go on with this.

James Weber: Just to jump in. Fiona, I can see your question there in the webinar chat. That would be worth consulting with us over, I would say. So I would just vote in the poll.

So, William, also in the chat, we have a feature now called AI search, and that allows you to locate information like that when you don't have the most specific information. It can suggest the most likely asset.

Again, if you haven't seen that work and you'd like to, feel free, just vote in the poll. Learn more or even one of those options, and that can be set up for you if you'd like to take a look at the feature.

Davey Clark: I'm actually struggling to read any more of these. The chat seems to be scrolling quicker than I can read.

James Weber: I can see there's 17 questions in the Q&A section.

So there's a question here. Can asset data be pulled into SFG20 from a CAFM system?

Davey Clark: It can, depending on the file that's used to export it from your CAFM system. We can do an upload from certain files, CAFM files, Excel files, straight into our SFG20 software.

James Weber: Okay, so it was a question around 80% completion. How do you measure that? I think that's just based on how many assets you actually have in a building versus how many are actually tracked in the asset register.

So there's a question here around how our integration works. So the SFG20 task cards for each code, so depending on how the integration will work between each partner. I mean, they more or less follow the same, you know, best practices, which means it's a seamless data exchange. The information, once you know, you've applied updates in Facilities-iQ will flow through to your CAFM, which means that once you've accepted a legislative update within Facilities-iQ and applied it, it would then flow through to your CAFM.

So can all CAFM systems be used with SFG20, or is the data restricted? So as far as I know, like there's no planned limitation on the amount of CAFM systems that can integrate with SFG20. It's just a matter of talking to each company and getting that integration set up. If, you know, if you can't, if you aren't, if your CAFM system doesn't integrate with SFG20, just send them a message to demonstrate that you as the customer, you know, find that very important.

And then, you know, it'll make it easier for us to have that conversation with them because they'll see the customer requirement.

So there's one question I think probably you could answer, Davey, that says how do we link the asset register to the SFG20 PPMs?

Davey Clark: We have an AI mapping. When we receive the data from the client, the AI mapping tool can import from their file straight into Facilities-iQ and create a maintenance regime directly from that.

James Weber: I see a question here from Neil saying, as an FM, we use SFG20 for our tendering process. Do you have a utility to make this process easier? Tendering is certainly an area that benefits from SFG20 just because you can create that precise specification. If you have Facilities-iQ, we have a feature called a maintenance regime, which does make the, which I guess you would say is a utility to make this process easier. If you'd like to, again, if you'd like to see more about that, you can vote in the poll. We can, you know, have an SFG20 expert show you how that would actually work. So you can see how you'd be able to apply that to your operation.

And, yes, the AI mapping would work with HTM schedules that we have within SFG20.

Let me just go through the webinar chat.

Yeah. All right. I think we've probably answered all of the questions that we can here. Yes, there will be written up answers to all of these questions. You will get a recording of the webinar and we also will share the slides as well. So, thanks everyone for joining us today.

We're going to turn our cameras off and mute ourselves. But we'll leave the webinar going for another five minutes and if you have any more questions that you can think of, just, you know, put them down in the webinar chat or leave them in the Q&A and we'll make sure we get back to you. All right, thanks guys.