Most of the recommendations have been mentioned at some portion in this report, but will be addressed below. The first and probably most obvious recommendation is that outsourcing of routine maintenance has been demonstrated successfully and has resulted in some benefits and some disadvantages for the road authorities. There are numerous studies that indicated this to be true.
Secondly, there are numerous means and ways on how to begin the outsourcing, but wise decisions and much background study makes for successful results. It is not the intension here to provide guidelines, but some main points for consideration are addressed as follows:
• Study and evaluate national and international practices
• Outsourcing is a political and socially sensitive decision - decision at high levels
• How to "Open the Market" to maintenance competition?
• Should have some form of pilot testing comparison of in-house versus out-sourced
• Low-bid or Quality based selection criteria should be evaluated
• Should use performance criteria or Levels of Service (LOS)
• Writing good contracts (risks, sanctions, & performance expectations). Requires expertise, and concise contract language. Consider adapting existing contracts rather than creating new ones
• Some form of interactive web-based, automated, & flexible "Maintenance Management System"
• Should work together with the maintenance industry & good open communications (create trust)
• Develop some type of Partnering and trust
Third recommendation once the outsourcing has begun is to determine a strategy for the next several years. This strategy should be a client team effort working and at periods include industry/ maintenance contractor feedback. Some issues could be as highlighted:
• What areas in road of network will be placed into competition, if not entire network
• Stager or phase-in contracts over several years & possibly starting with 3 year contracts "Unit Prices". The progress toward longer durations and "Lump Sum" contracts
• How implemented into your organization (following New Zealand or Finland model)
• Attempt to go forward with 5, 7 and longer duration contracts
• Specify contract duration for the exact years desired like 5+2 or 7+2 years and retain some flexibility, but not 3+1+2+2 or 3+3+3 (it's the first value that counts as nothing else is fixed)
• Moving toward Lump Sum contracts
• Integrating more elements of routine maintenance into one contract
• Start using QC by contractors
• Developing some type of interoperable maintenance management IT systems
• How is performance being evaluated (pass/fail or based on actual performance measurements)
• Develop IT systems to include customer complaint feedback directly to contractor (with tracking)
• Determine how to evaluate the competence, ability to perform, and QC
• Consider sanctions and rewards in contracts
Fourthly, once the outsourcing of maintenance has matured enough, there should be some benchmarking. Also, there needs to be some re-engineering of the process and ideas included:
• Value for money studies
• Openly reporting the status of maintenance contracting
• Is there a healthy maintenance contracting industry
• Having some form of sharing best practices & lessons learned
• Should you have some type of continuous improvement process & bench-marking system
• Continue following international trends and development