Workloads

[Newton Hunt]

I set up a schedule of how often I thought I should tune pianos based
upon their usage:
  Office
  Practice room
  Class room
  Studio 1 (keyboard
  Studio 2 (voice, violin, etc.)
  Performance

Since I had 165 instruments, 220 performances and heavy maintenance
because of the advanced age of the stock, humidity ranging from 15% to
85%, new loaner pianos that needed LOTS of tuning I divided this number
by TWO.

Each time an instrument was tuned, the date, services, retail value of 1
for a tuning, 1.5 for a pitch raise, .5 for a string, 30 for a
regulation with hammers, etc., etc.  The formulas calculated the due
date for the next tuning for that instrument.  THey were sorted so the
next due were always at the top of the list.

This list was maintained in a spread sheet, each piano had a unique
number so records of service was stored elsewhere by unique number and
long term records were stored by academic year.

It was an easy, effect, efficient and consistent system.

My mistake was in not posting the list so everyone could see when their
pianos was due and not bother me and try to get service out of sequence
unless for sting breakage, pedal problems or other needed maintenance
needs.

All this could have been set up with a data base management system
(DBMS) but I preferred the spread sheet because I could see more records
at a time and I knew better how to set it up.

		Newton