How to Prepare for the Delivery of Your New Machine

If you’re expecting the delivery of your valuable new asset, you may be wondering how to prepare. It’s essential to install and commission new equipment safely, and on schedule, so we’ve put together a checklist to help you make sure that happens.

Here’s our machine mover’s guide to preparing your site for the arrival of your new machine.

Make sure your contractor has sufficient insurance

If you’ve engaged a company with proven experience to undertake the work safely, they probably have ample insurance in place. However, it’s best to check beforehand.

Your contractor must have the right type of insurance, to include possible damage to your site and machine, plus adequate cover for the value of your new asset.

Flag any known issues

It helps you and your contractor if you warn them of any known issues. For example, have any previous machine installations been delayed? Has anything been damaged? Have any past deliveries caused problems for you or your neighbours? Has there been any near misses?

When warned, your contractor can plan to reduce the risk of damaging your machine or affecting your production schedule.

Complete a risk assessment

Review the delivery route and target location. Assess things such as the following examples:

• Floor loadings
• Overhead obstructions
• Pinch-points along the route
• Electrical, chemical or fire hazards

Share your findings with your contractor.

Notify your staff and neighbours

We’ve found that it helps to warn everyone who might be affected. It helps them to prepare, which is good for your relationships, and you could get some useful feedback that allows you to avoid hidden problems.

Feedback could help you to avoid common issues such as scheduling conflicts and production downtime, and shared spaces can sometimes cause a problem. If you share an entrance and parking area, it’s best to speak with your neighbours as early as possible and again the day before.

Clear the delivery route and working area

Make sure you clear vehicles, skips, materials and products, from the delivery route, from where the delivery vehicle will need to park and wherever your contractor will need to transport your new machine.

In addition to safety for all, including your machine, obstructions cause delays that can affect production schedules.

Over to You

We all want our new machines to be delivered safely and on time, and that’s usually the case in our experience.

However, in our 40 years of moving machines, we’ve noted how important it is to plan well and prepare. We always do, but that hasn’t always been true of the site receiving a new machine.

Hopefully, the steps above will help you to make sure that your next delivery goes smoothly. Do let us know if you would like some help with it.