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When a fault arises which cannot be resolved by the maintainer
it will require a report to be made to the manufacturer so
that an independent investigation can begin.
The manufacturer will require as much information about the
fault and site as is available. They will then attempt to
recreate the fault and hence determine the causes and countermeasures.
Part of the investigation may include a site visit with the
maintainer to re-examine the system and test out the
countermeasures. An alternative will be to supply the details
and any necessary equipment to the maintainer for them to
resolve the problem.
The information required by the manufacturer will include
the following. Most of which will be available from the site
records and maintainer investigation.
The name, address, telephone and fax number, and contact for
the customer.
The name, address, telephone and fax number, and contact for
the maintainer.
The system type and configuration plus options fitted and
extensions used, plus installation date.
Software levels installed.
Program setting details from the site.
Any previous fault history of the site including upgrades
and equipment changes since it was installed.
There must also be as full a report as possible on the fault
itself.
This will need to cover the circumstances in which the fault
occurs and the parts of the system involved together with
the attempts which have been made so far to rectify it.
In cases where the fault is a recurring one the customer should
be asked to keep a fault log of these occurrences. This must
include certain minimum information to be worthwhile.
A suggested list is:
Date and time of the fault
A description of the fault itself
Which lines or channels were involved
Which extensions were involved
What tones and displays were heard and seen
In addition any other observations made will prove useful.
Some systems will incorporate an event port or data-logging
interface which can be used to capture and store for analysis
the system’s internal activity. A record of this data
from the time of a fault used in conjunction with the fault
data above is very often a key part of the manufacturer investigation.
Therefore where such a facility exists it will be necessary
to use it and provide complete fault logs for each occurrence
covered by the log.
Such data will be complex and impossible to analyse in isolation
form the other required information and even so may take several
days work to complete.
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