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Key Responsibilities and Required Skills for Underground Maintenance Planner

💰 $ - $

MaintenanceMiningUndergroundReliabilityPlanning

🎯 Role Definition

The Underground Maintenance Planner is responsible for developing, prioritizing and scheduling all maintenance activities for underground assets to maximize equipment availability, reduce unplanned downtime, and ensure safe, compliant operations. This role partners with operations, reliability engineering, stores, procurement and contractors to plan work scopes, issue work orders through the CMMS, prepare materials and resources for shutdowns and routine maintenance, and deliver continuous improvement of maintenance processes across underground plant and mobile equipment fleets.

📈 Career Progression

Typical Career Path

Entry Point From:

  • Maintenance Technician / Fitter with strong underground experience
  • Junior Planner / Planner Assistant
  • Reliability Technician or Mechanical Tradesperson transitioning to planning

Advancement To:

  • Senior Maintenance Planner (Underground)
  • Maintenance Superintendent / Maintenance Manager (Underground)
  • Reliability Manager / Asset Management Lead

Lateral Moves:

  • Reliability Engineer (focus on RCM and PdM)
  • Shutdown & Turnaround Planner
  • Stores & Inventory Supervisor (spares optimization)

Core Responsibilities

Primary Functions

  • Develop and maintain short-, medium- and long-term maintenance schedules for underground plant and mobile equipment using CMMS (e.g., SAP PM or IBM Maximo), ensuring alignment with production schedules and safety constraints.
  • Create detailed work packs and job plans that include scope, procedures, isolation and safe work methods, required materials, tooling, calibration needs and estimated labour hours to execute corrective and preventive maintenance reliably and safely.
  • Plan and coordinate all shutdowns, partial isolations and planned outages underground — preparing detailed schedules, resource plans, contractor scopes, material lists, and risk controls to minimize lost production.
  • Review and prioritize incoming work orders based on safety risk, production impact, regulatory compliance, and maintenance strategy (corrective, preventive, predictive), ensuring critical work is executed on time.
  • Liaise daily with operations supervisors and shift supervisors to confirm access windows for underground maintenance, manage work sequencing and communicate changes that affect production or safety.
  • Forecast spare parts and critical inventory requirements for upcoming planned maintenance and outages, raise requisitions or engage stores/procurement to ensure material availability and reduce backorders.
  • Apply condition monitoring and predictive maintenance data (vibration, oil analysis, thermography) to plan condition-based interventions and optimize machinery lifecycle and maintenance intervals.
  • Analyze historical failure data and maintenance metrics (MTBF, MTTR, backlog) to identify recurring failures, propose durable corrective actions and update maintenance strategies or BOMs accordingly.
  • Prepare, schedule and manage contractor scopes and work packs for specialist underground maintenance, including performance expectations, competency and safety requirements, and site induction coordination.
  • Ensure all planned work complies with site safety procedures, confined space and gas testing protocols, electrical isolation permits, and other statutory requirements for underground work.
  • Maintain and update asset registers, BOMs, maintenance history and equipment manuals within the CMMS to ensure accuracy for planning, budgeting and audits.
  • Coordinate specialist trades, commissioning teams and OEM technicians for complex repairs, rebuilds or equipment upgrades underground, ensuring correct sequence and resource allocation.
  • Optimize weekly and daily planner schedules to manage labour allocation, minimize multi-trade conflicts, and ensure efficient use of fitters, electricians, instrument technicians and mechanical crews.
  • Lead pre-job and post-job review meetings to confirm scope understanding, capture lessons learned, record root causes, and implement preventive measures to avoid repeat failures.
  • Develop and maintain standardised job templates, risk assessments, permits and procedures to speed work pack generation while ensuring compliance with safety and quality standards.
  • Support reliability engineering initiatives by providing planning input, failure mode data and cost-to-fix estimates for reliability improvement projects and CAPEX submissions.
  • Track and report maintenance KPIs and performance metrics to maintenance management (work order completion, schedule attainment, craft productivity, backlog trends), using dashboards and CMMS reporting.
  • Manage budgetary aspects of planned maintenance including labour hours, contractor spend and material usage, providing input to annual maintenance budgets and cost-control measures.
  • Facilitate cross-functional coordination for modifications, upgrades and retrofits in the underground environment, ensuring maintenance constraints are embedded in project planning and commissioning.
  • Ensure timely close-out of work orders with accurate labor, materials, downtime and failure coding so maintenance history supports future planning and reliability analysis.
  • Train, mentor and coach junior planners or planner assistants in job pack preparation, CMMS usage, and site-specific underground safety and planning best practices.
  • Participate in continuous improvement programs (5S, Kaizen, Lean Maintenance) to reduce waste in planning processes, improve planner-to-craft ratios and drive better maintenance outcomes.

Secondary Functions

  • Provide on-call planning support for emergency breakdowns and major incidents, rapidly converting reactive repairs into documented planned work and root-cause actions.
  • Support spare parts obsolescence reviews and recommend critical spares rationalization to improve inventory turns and reduce carrying costs for underground operations.
  • Collaborate with procurement to expedite long-lead items and vendor-sourced components required for critical underground repairs.
  • Assist in contractor prequalification, scope development and performance reviews for underground maintenance service providers.
  • Contribute planning expertise to site HAZOPs, safety reviews and job hazard analyses for changes affecting underground maintenance activities.
  • Lead small Kaizen projects related to work pack standardization, CMMS optimisation, and planner craft allocation improvements.
  • Support audits and regulatory inspections by providing maintenance records, work histories and evidence of compliance for underground assets.
  • Maintain continuous communication with shift teams to update planned work sequences and ensure minimal handover friction between day and night shifts.
  • Document and update site-specific underground maintenance procedures, isolation checklists and permit-to-work templates.
  • Assist in capital works turnover to maintenance, ensuring preventive maintenance tasks and spares are embedded into the asset handover process.

Required Skills & Competencies

Hard Skills (Technical)

  • Proficient in CMMS systems such as SAP PM, IBM Maximo, Infor EAM or equivalent for creating job plans, managing work orders and generating reports.
  • Experienced in developing detailed job plans, isolation procedures, and safe work method statements for underground maintenance tasks.
  • Strong understanding of underground mining equipment (loaders, haul trucks, conveyors, pumps, ventilation systems), electrical distribution and instrumentation.
  • Proven ability to plan and coordinate complex shutdowns/turnarounds including contractor management and resource levelling.
  • Knowledge of predictive maintenance technologies and condition monitoring tools (vibration analysis, oil analysis, thermography, ultrasonic testing).
  • Competent in spare parts management, BOM creation and materials forecasting to support planned maintenance.
  • Familiar with reliability frameworks such as RCM (Reliability-Centered Maintenance), FMEA and RCA methodologies.
  • Experience using scheduling tools like MS Project, Oracle Primavera P6 or other resource/scheduling software.
  • Skilled in reading mechanical, hydraulic, pneumatic and electrical schematics and OEM manuals relevant to underground equipment.
  • Strong data literacy: ability to extract and analyze maintenance KPIs, backlog metrics, and mean time calculations to inform planning decisions.
  • Knowledge of regulatory and statutory requirements for underground work (confined spaces, gas testing, electrical safety).
  • Competent in procurement and contractor scope development for maintenance works.

Soft Skills

  • Excellent stakeholder management and communication skills — able to negotiate access windows and convey technical scope to operations, maintenance crews and contractors.
  • Strong prioritization and time management to balance reactive breakdowns with planned preventative work under production constraints.
  • Problem-solving mindset with a focus on root cause analysis and durable corrective actions.
  • Attention to detail for accurate job packs, BOMs and work order close-outs.
  • Leadership and coaching ability to mentor junior planners and influence multi-disciplinary teams.
  • Resilience and adaptability to operate in high-pressure, changing underground mining environments.
  • Collaborative team player who can build trust with operations, safety, stores and contracting partners.
  • Continuous improvement mindset with a focus on process standardization and waste reduction in maintenance planning.

Education & Experience

Educational Background

Minimum Education:

  • Trade qualification (mechanical fitter, electrician, instrumentation) OR diploma in engineering with relevant underground experience.

Preferred Education:

  • Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical, Electrical, Mining or Industrial Engineering or equivalent technical qualification.
  • Certifications in planning, reliability engineering (e.g., CRE, CMRP) or safety systems (e.g., Permit to Work, confined space).

Relevant Fields of Study:

  • Mechanical Engineering
  • Electrical/Electronic Engineering
  • Mining Engineering
  • Industrial Engineering / Reliability Engineering
  • Heavy Vehicle & Mechanical Trades

Experience Requirements

Typical Experience Range: 3–8 years in maintenance roles with at least 2–4 years focused on planning in underground mining or tunnelling environments.

Preferred:

  • 5+ years as a Maintenance Planner in underground mining, tunnelling or heavy industrial sites with hands-on trade experience.
  • Demonstrated experience with SAP PM or Maximo, shutdown planning, contractor management and condition-based maintenance programs.
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