Building maintenance management in Malaysia

Abstract

Investment in building maintenance is huge all over the world. In most countries, it represents almost 50 per cent of the total turnover of the construction industry. The value of buildings depends on the quality of the maintenance invested in them. Maintenance management involves obtaining maximum benefi t from the investment made on the maintenance activities. Maintenance in buildings in Malaysia is on the increase regardless of size, type, location, and ownership. The current maintenance management procedures in Malaysia are, however, condition and reactive based. The weaknesses in the current procedures are the primary problems because they do not explicitly link maintenance needs with building performance with respect to the building users. The building users measure the performance of a building with various criteria. The condition of a building is just one of those criteria. This research establishes the need for a building maintenance management system that is based on the concept of value in the effort to lead towards the optimisation of building maintenance programmes. Maintenance management that is value based allows users to be proactively put at the centre of maintenance management during decisionmaking processes and takes into consideration both the objective and subjective requirements of users.

Interval of Routine Maintenance and Maintenance Performance: A Literature Review

“…The most common building maintenance issue, revealed in 14 publications, relates to the lack of preventive maintenance plan. For instance, Lateef [7] argued that there is a huge backlog of building maintenance in Malaysia due to the ignorance towards proactive and preventive maintenance. Other maintenance issues include neglect towards importance of maintenance and high maintenance cost, discussed in 5 and 3 publications respectively.…”

“…Public neglects the importance of building maintenance as a result of the massive costs required for maintenance operations [7]. Meanwhile, ineffective planning of maintenance strategies and low service quality are another issues of maintenance management in Malaysia [8,9].…”

“…The building residents neglect the importance of maintenance. Lateef [7] noted that building maintenance in Malaysia is conditionally driven and is usually concerned when there is cost allocation. There is no proper planning on building maintenance.…”

“…In Malaysia, many buildings are even having lack of adequate maintenance [7]. Corrective maintenance is often carried out instead of other proper maintenance strategies.…”

Study on Maintenance Practices for School Buildings in Terengganu and Kedah, Malaysia

“…The prime aim of maintenance is to preserve a building in its initial stage, and some of the main reasons for maintaining a building are to retain the value of the investment, to maintain the building in a condition where it continues to fulfil its function, and to present a good appearance [5]. Besides, effective maintenance management embraces many skills, including identifying maintenance needs and specifying the right remedies.…”