What should I check before buying an industrial maintenance company?

A plant maintenance contractor sells skilled people, equipment and trust. The people and the trust do not appear on a balance sheet, so the checks go beyond the statements. Work through the questions below with your accountant and lawyer, and keep notes on what the owner says against what the records show, because the gaps are where the surprises sit.

Recurring work against spikes

Ask for revenue split by type: routine maintenance, shutdown and turnaround work, and one-off installs. Routine work tends to repeat, while shutdown work may swing from year to year. Ask your accountant to help you see which months carry the year, and what a quiet year would look like. Ask how the firm keeps crews busy between shutdowns.

People and relationships

Find out who actually holds each plant relationship, the owner, a foreman or a lead hand. Ask which trade qualifications the work needs and confirm the crew holds them, checking with the relevant authority where it matters. Ask how long key people have stayed. A crew that follows the owner out the door is a risk to raise with your advisers.

Equipment, vehicles and safety

• Rigging, lifting gear and specialty tooling: inspection and service records.
• Service trucks and trailers: condition, ownership and any liens.
• Safety record as customers see it, including any plant that has paused the firm’s work.
• Insurance history and any open claims.

What the owner does personally

List the owner’s weekly tasks: quoting, site visits, scheduling, billing, customer calls. Whatever the owner does, someone must do after closing. Ask whether the seller will stay on for a transition period. The contracts behind the revenue deserve their own review, so see how to check an industrial maintenance company’s customer contracts.