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Reactive Maintenance in Software Engineering

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Reactive Maintenance, as name suggests, is a maintenance strategy that is applied when failure has already occurred. In this, assets such as equipment, component, etc. are repaired and restored to their normal operating functions only after their failure or are broken down or their poor performance. It simply follows Newton’s third law of motion that states that “for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction”. It simply describes nature of force and human nature to react to any action as per requirement. Similarly, reactive maintenance is also performed to fix asset after it’s broken or is failed. Reactive maintenance is started and initiated in some cases are equipment failure, requiring repair, or restoring equipment to its normal condition. But one should look for other maintenance strategies as someone has said that “prevention is better than cure”. It’s better to prevent equipment from failure than to repair it after failure. 

  • Reactive maintenance is a type of software maintenance that focuses on fixing problems as they occur, rather than proactively addressing potential issues. This approach is also known as “break-fix” maintenance and it is characterized by fixing bugs and errors in the system after they have been reported by users.
  • Reactive maintenance is typically triggered by an incident, such as a system failure or a customer complaint, and it is focused on restoring normal operation as quickly as possible. This approach is often used when the system is critical and downtime must be minimized.

The benefits of reactive maintenance include:

  • Minimizing downtime by addressing problems quickly
    Focusing on critical issues that are affecting the system’s performance
    Reducing the cost of maintenance by only addressing problems as they occur
    However, reactive maintenance also has some drawbacks, including:
  • Lack of proactive identification and resolution of potential problems
    Difficulty in predicting when and how often incidents will occur
    Increased risk of system failures and customer dissatisfaction
    Higher costs in the long run as problems are likely to recur without addressing root cause
    Reactive maintenance is generally considered less efficient than proactive maintenance, as it focuses on fixing problems after they have occurred rather than preventing them from happening in the first place. In many cases, it is more beneficial to adopt a proactive maintenance strategy that includes regular testing, monitoring, and updating of the system to prevent problems from occurring.

Advantages : There are several advantages of reactive maintenance as given below :

  1. Requires less time and money : Obviously, if someone does not maintain unbroken equipment, that simply means there is no cost required for maintaining equipment. Money is saved rather than spending it on maintenance of equipment. In simple words, we can say one can save money and time by doing nothing rather than spending time and money by doing something. In reactive maintenance, it is similar to one save money and time both by not maintaining equipment.
  2. Requires fewer members : In preventive maintenance, additional members are required to maintain equipment who has to regularly check condition of equipment. In this type of maintenance strategy, no maintenance of equipment is required so it requires fewer members to perform repair after equipment breakdown. Small group of members is required to perform repair after failure.
  3. No planning needed : In preventive maintenance, it requires a lot of planning to maintain equipment and prevent them from failure. But, in reactive maintenance, less planning is required as one does not need to plan for preventing equipment from failure.
  4. Minimizing downtime: By addressing problems quickly, reactive maintenance can help to minimize downtime and restore normal operation as soon as possible.
  5. Focusing on critical issues: Reactive maintenance can help to focus on critical issues that are affecting the system’s performance, ensuring that the most important problems are addressed first.
  6. Reducing the cost of maintenance: Reactive maintenance can reduce the cost of maintenance by only addressing problems as they occur, rather than proactively addressing potential issues.
  7. Flexibility: Reactive maintenance allows for flexibility in addressing problems, as it can be adjusted based on the severity and urgency of the problem at hand.
  8. Cost-effective solution: Reactive maintenance can be a cost-effective solution, especially for systems that are not critical and have a low downtime tolerance.

Disadvantages : Other than advantages, there are several disadvantages of reactive maintenance as given below :

  1. Safety issues : When proper planning is done to perform each task in scheduled and appropriate manner, then one can maintain and perform tasks with complete safety. But in reactive maintenance, working team is under pressure as planning is not done in such type of maintenance strategy. Same issue can reoccur after repairment also if proper maintenance strategy is not applied.
  2. More expensive : If proper maintenance strategy is not applied, then system can fail at any time during working hours or during production. It can cause greater damage to overall system and can lead to decrease in production and increase in repair cost.
  3. Time-consuming : Reactive maintenance is more time-consuming as, after failure, team members take much more time to take corrective actions to repair equipment. This also leads to delay in production.
  4. Inefficient use of resources : Repairment of equipment requires greater use of resources and time consuming also. One needs to order corrective parts and also wait to be issued.
  5. Increased downtime: When problems occur, they can cause the system to fail or become unavailable, which can lead to increased downtime and lost productivity.
  6. Higher costs: Reactive maintenance can be more expensive in the long run, as problems are likely to recur without addressing the root cause. Additionally, the cost of restoring normal operation can be higher than the cost of preventing the problem in the first place.
  7. Difficulty in predicting when and how often incidents will occur: Without a proactive maintenance strategy, it can be difficult to predict when problems will occur, making it difficult to plan and allocate resources.
  8. Increased risk of system failures and customer dissatisfaction: Without a proactive maintenance strategy, there is a higher risk of system failures, which can lead to customer dissatisfaction and lost business.
  9. Lack of proactive identification and resolution of potential problems: Reactive maintenance only addresses problems after they have occurred, which means that potential problems may not be identified and resolved until they cause an incident.
  10. Difficulty in identifying the root cause: Reactive maintenance often focuses on fixing the immediate problem, rather than identifying the root cause of the problem, which can lead to problems recurring in the future.

In order to minimize the drawbacks of reactive maintenance, it is important to adopt a proactive maintenance strategy that includes regular testing, monitoring, and updating of the system to prevent


Last Updated : 25 Jan, 2023
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