|
Service parts are commonly known as spare parts or spares and are component parts fitted to original equipment such as cars, aeroplanes, machines, etc. during maintenance or repair.
The manufacturer of a piece of brand new, original equipment is known as the Original Equipment Manufacturer or OEM.
Parts fitted at the time of original manufacture are known as OE parts and may or may not be the same specification or from the same supplier as the service parts fitted during maintenance or repair. When they are identical, the term genuine parts is commonly used to distinguish those service parts from any substitutes.
Substitute service parts that are not genuine parts are commonly known as non-OE parts, copy parts, pattern parts or all-makes.
After the equipment is sold to a customer, the ongoing support and maintenance of that equipment is called aftersales, the aftermarket, customer support, Original Equipment Service (OES), asset management, parts and service, or just service business. Different product industries call it different things.
The Service Parts industry therefore includes the manufacturers, distributors and retailers of the service parts; the consumers of the service parts such as the repairers or maintainers of original equipment and the owners of original equipment that need to keep it maintained such as equipment operators/users, fleet managers, leasing companies and insurers.
Support engineering is the activity of designing a support solution including designing and developing equipment in such a way as to make it easier and/or less costly to maintain. This is most effective when done during design of original equipment, however it can also be done at a later stage in an equipment’s life during upgrade or modification. This is particularly common with military equipment to increase mission/operational capability.
Military customers have a variety of terms for their aftermarket support environment. Logistics support, often abbreviated to logistics, is the group of activities associated with supporting military personnel and equipment during operations and incorporates all aspects of maintenance, demand forecasting, inventory management, spares procurement, etc. as well as the physical logistics of storage and transport.
Within the non-military world, the term logistics is usually replaced with supply chain management. A supply chain can extend from raw material extraction/generation through to the end consumer of a finished product/service and when managed or controlled to this extent is often referred to as end to end or E2E.
This glossary is merely intended as an introduction to some of the common terminology used in the Service Parts industry and is not intended to be exhaustive. Contact us... for further explanation or additional information.
Top...
|
