Skip to main content
PM Assist
6 Free Checklists

BMS & Controls Maintenance Checklist

Free maintenance checklists for building management systems and the controls layer underneath them — BMS panels and head-ends, DDC controllers, variable speed drives, sensors and actuators. Each includes preventive tasks, service frequencies, common faults and safety notes.

Download PDF templatesBuild a custom checklist

Controls maintenance is mostly about drift rather than wear. A useful checklist covers sensor calibration, actuator and valve travel, panel condition and terminations, alarm and override housekeeping, and — the task most often missed — verifying that a current backup of the control strategy and graphics actually exists and restores. Choose the checklist for your specific equipment below.

Other maintenance checklist categories

HVAC maintenance checklists — Air handling units, fan coils, chillers, VRF, ductwork and extract systems — filters, coils, refrigerant and damper checks.
heating maintenance checklists — Boilers, calorifiers, heat exchangers, heat pumps and flues — combustion, controls and hot water safety checks.
plumbing and water system maintenance checklists — Pressurisation units, booster sets, storage tanks, TMVs and water treatment — pressure, hygiene and legionella control.
electrical maintenance checklists — Distribution boards, switchgear, generators, UPS, solar PV and EV charging — inspection, testing and thermographic checks.
fire safety maintenance checklists — Fire dampers, alarms, emergency lighting, sprinklers, risers and fire doors — the statutory checks and their records.
metering maintenance checklists — Energy, heat, water and gas meters — read integrity, accuracy checks and the data quality behind aM&T reporting.
lift maintenance checklists — Passenger, goods and platform lifts and escalators — LOLER thorough examination, entrapment release and door safety.
All maintenance checklists·preventive maintenance checklist·building maintenance checklist·Statutory inspection checklists·Free checklist templates·Compliance and FM topics

How often should a BMS be maintained?

There is no statutory maintenance interval for a BMS, so frequencies come from the manufacturer's O&M manual, SFG20-style task schedules and how critical the systems under control are. A common pattern in UK commercial buildings is a monthly review of active alarms and manual overrides, a quarterly visit covering panel condition and spot-checks of key sensors, and an annual service that calibrates control sensors, exercises actuators and valves through full travel, and verifies the strategy backup.

Criticality should drive the interval more than the calendar. Controls serving data halls, laboratories or healthcare spaces usually justify monthly attention and trend-based condition monitoring; a small packaged plant controller may be fine on an annual cycle. Where a site has a maintenance contract with the controls vendor, check what it actually covers — front-end software support and field device calibration are frequently priced separately, and sensor calibration is the part most often excluded.

The two checks that matter most

The first is manual overrides. A BMS that has been driven by hand during a fault and never returned to automatic will keep running that way indefinitely, silently wasting energy and masking the original problem. Auditing every point in hand, writing down why, and returning it to auto is one of the highest-value hours anyone spends on a controls system. Trend logs make this visible: a valve that never modulates or a fan running at a fixed speed is usually a forgotten override rather than a design intent.

The second is calibration. Control sensors drift, and a temperature sensor reading two degrees high will hold a whole system at the wrong setpoint while every screen shows compliance. Spot-checking sensors against a calibrated instrument, and recording the deviation before adjusting, catches this. Both checks depend on knowing what the system was commissioned to do — which is why keeping the commissioning records, control strategy description and points schedule findable matters as much as the maintenance itself.

Safe working on control panels

Most BMS panels contain both extra-low-voltage control wiring and mains-voltage supplies, and work inside them falls under the Electricity at Work Regulations 1989. Live working should be avoided; where a panel has to be opened with the supply on for diagnostic reasons, that needs a documented justification, a competent person and the right precautions. Isolating a controls panel can also stop the plant it serves, so the isolation needs planning with the building's operational requirements in mind — particularly for panels feeding fire, smoke control or life-safety interfaces.

Always refer to the manufacturer's O&M manual and the site-specific risk assessment for the exact requirements on your building. The checklists below are practical starting points reflecting SFG20 schedules and CIBSE Guide H guidance on building control systems, not a substitute for either.

Frequently asked questions

Find the detail behind every checklist

PM Assist makes your O&M manuals, settings, and records instantly searchable — so engineers get the specifications and procedures behind each task in seconds.

Start freeBrowse all checklists