Turnaround / plant shutdown service SOP
A turnaround and plant shutdown service SOP for instrumentation: scope and resource the shutdown window with the customer, coordinate safety, isolate, calibrate, repair and certify every covered instrument before the final report.
How it works
Match the lanes to your own shutdown crew
This chart uses Project Manager, Field Service, Calibration Lab, QA and Customer. If a turnaround is large enough that Insatech fields a dedicated shutdown coordinator separate from the account's usual project manager, give that role its own lane rather than folding it into Project Manager — a turnaround's resourcing decisions are exactly where that distinction matters.
Put real numbers on the resourcing steps
"Plan technicians and reference equipment for the shutdown window" is only useful as a plan if it names a headcount and a list of reference standards, not just "crew booked". Write the actual numbers into the row's comment field so anyone checking coverage mid-shutdown can see what was planned against what showed up.
Decide what counts as a Fail on the as-found check
"Instruments pass as-found check?" needs a stated tolerance, the same acceptance criteria used on a routine calibration, not a looser bar because the window is short. Write the criteria into the row's comment so the pace of a shutdown week never becomes a reason to wave through a borderline reading.
Set People and Workload on every row before you rely on the BI panel
The workload panel can only total hours for rows that carry them. Fill in People and Workload for each step as you adapt the chart, using realistic effort hours for a compressed window rather than elapsed calendar time, so a demanding shutdown week actually shows up as one in the right person's totals.
Decide what counts as a traceability gap
"Traceability gap found?" is only consistent if QA and the Calibration Lab agree in advance on what triggers it, a reference certificate that lapsed during the window, one that was never attached, or a standard substituted without being logged. List the examples directly in "Resolve traceability gap with Calibration Lab" so it isn't interpreted differently by whoever is on the shutdown that week.
Frequently asked questions
How is a turnaround SOP different from Insatech's routine Preventive Maintenance & Calibration Planning SOP?
Preventive Maintenance & Calibration Planning works one instrument at a time against a standing service-agreement schedule. A turnaround is a fixed, short, high-pressure window where normally-running equipment is deliberately down and many instruments have to be tested by a planned crew in a compressed timeframe, working inside the customer's own shutdown safety coordination rather than Insatech's own site rules — which is why this chart puts scope, instrument coverage and crew and equipment planning upfront as their own phase, rather than starting straight at the first instrument.
Why does safety coordination sit in a Customer lane instead of Insatech's own process?
"Safety coordination with customer's shutdown team" and "Isolate instruments under customer's permit-to-work" both name the reality that during a turnaround, the plant's own shutdown team runs safety coordination for every contractor on site, not just Insatech's crew. Drawing that lane explicitly stops the handoff from being assumed, and makes clear which procedures govern isolation before a technician ever reaches an instrument.
What happens when an instrument fails the as-found check during a shutdown?
The "Instruments pass as-found check?" decision routes a Fail to "Repair defects found during testing" before the instrument's data is collected. Keeping this as a real branch, rather than a note added after the fact, matters more on a turnaround than on a routine visit, because the volume and pace of a shutdown week is exactly the condition under which a failed reading is most likely to get carried forward unaddressed.
Why is there a separate decision for traceability gaps after the data is already collected?
"Verify traceability of all results" checks every reference standard used during the window against its own valid calibration certificate, not just the instruments under test. A reference that lapses mid-shutdown invalidates every result taken with it, so "Traceability gap found?" catches that before "Issue final report", routing a gap to "Resolve traceability gap with Calibration Lab" rather than letting it reach the customer's record unnoticed.
Who typically carries the most hours across a turnaround, and does that show up in the chart?
In this template, Daniel Cole's Calibration Lab hours concentrate in the compressed "Calibrate and test covered instruments" step, while Martin Hoyer's Project Manager hours span the whole chart, from "Define scope with customer" through "Issue final report". Because every row carries the People and Workload columns, the workload BI panel can total both patterns directly instead of requiring a separate spreadsheet to see who a shutdown week actually falls on.