📘 Screen: Department, Maintenance Group & Symptom
One screen, three records. This is where you register the department responsible for the job (mechanics, tire shop, electrical, welding, lubrication, outside), the maintenance group that groups the jobs (combine servicing, hydraulic system, undercarriage) and the symptom the operator reports when the machine has a problem ("hard starting", "burnt-out light", "leaking oil").
All three feed the maintenance work order: the department says who fixes it, the group says what it's about and the symptom says what the machine is showing. That's what lets you find out, at the end of the season, that half the breakdowns were electrical problems.
📍 Location in the system
Menu: Fleet > Department, Maintenance Group & Symptom
🧩 Main function
Register departments, maintenance groups and symptoms, define which employees belong to each department and who the purchase order emails should go to.
🔀 The Type field decides what is being registered
| Type | What it is | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Department | The area responsible for the job. It's the most used type, and some farms also create departments by area or by person in charge, such as "Agriculture – Inputs" or "Livestock". | Mechanics, Tire shop, Electrical, Welding, Lubrication, Outside, Safety. |
| Maintenance Group | How the job is grouped, by machine system or by fleet family. | Combine servicing, hydraulics, undercarriage, air conditioning. |
| Symptom | What the machine shows, in the words of whoever operates it. | Hard starting, burnt-out light, leaking oil, losing power. |
The type is required: without it the system won't save. The list shows Code, Description, Type and Active, and the filter at the top (Department / Symptom / Maintenance Group / All, which is the default) keeps the three worlds apart.
📝 Main fields
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Code | Short identifier. |
| Description | Required. The name of the department, group or symptom. |
| Type | Required. Department, Symptom or Maintenance Group. |
| Emails for Purchase Order | Who receives the purchase order originating from this department. |
| Emails for Purchase Order Second approver | The second approval level, when the farm works with two signatures. |
| Active | Uncheck it to remove it from the lists without losing the history. |
| Notes | Anything else that needs to be recorded. |
🗂 Employee/Operator tab
The Employee/Operator tab defines who belongs to the department: the mechanic, the tire technician, the electrician. Pick the person, add a note if needed and save; the list below shows the department's team. That's the list that appears when recording labor on the maintenance work order. Employees come from the Employee/Operator record.
- Every maintenance work order has an owner: the responsible department
- Breakdowns are classified by nature, so you can see where the machine fails most
- The symptom reported by the operator comes in standardized, not as free text
- The department's purchase order reaches the approver by email
❓ Frequently asked questions
What's the difference between department, maintenance group and symptom?
The department is who does the work (mechanics, tire shop, welding). The maintenance group is how the job is grouped (combine servicing, hydraulics). The symptom is what the machine showed before the repair ("hard starting", "burnt-out light"). All three are registered on the same screen by changing the Type field.
How do I get the mechanic to show up when recording hours on the work order?
Link the employee to the department in this screen's Employee/Operator tab. Before that, they
need to be registered in Operations > Employee/Operator.
I tried to delete a department and the system wouldn't let me. Why?
Because there are records using it: maintenance work orders, activities on those orders or requisitions. If there are employees linked, they need to be removed first. In practice, the best route is to uncheck the Active field: the department disappears from the lists and the history stays intact.
What are the two email fields for?
To route the purchase order generated by that department: the first field is the regular recipient and the second is the second approver, for farms that require two approvals before buying.