Calibration Timing

[[Ke...]]

Fun story..

We received our quote for calibration, and had the PO issued within 2 weeks.

I just got an email stating that the technician isn't scheduled to be on site until a month (4 weeks) PAST the CMM calibration due date.

There was NO chance of getting the CMM scheduled on time.

Not even if we jumped through 20 hoops to get a PO out the same day... it's basic math.

Better email your reps 6 months in advance, if you want a chance of having your equipment scheduled on time...

 

[[DW...]]

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 I thought this was common knowledge? Zeiss told us to schedule AT LEAST 6 months out for the CMM, better if we could do 9 months. I set a reminder on the calendar. They just need a PO at scheduling time as a placeholder. 

[[Ke...]]

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Well, not so common, I suppose.

We have been receiving our quotes with plenty of time to schedule, in the past... and I've been scheduling calibrations through Zeiss for the last 10+ years, and it has never been an issue. 

[[Ja...]]

Yeah, the last few years we had been scheduling out calibrations about 6 months in advance after we got in a scheduling bind when we reached out our usual three months in advance and they gave us a five month lead time that would put our CMMs out of calibration for a couple months. Company ownership was very displeased.

Additionally, we have two machines and we used to get both done once a year during the same visit from the Zeiss calibration tech, it seemed to work well and helped reduce calibration costs. Then a few years ago Zeiss started charging double the travel time even though it was two machines done in the same visit that required an extra day, maybe two on site. We didn't mind paying the cost of those extra couple of days but double dipping on the the travel expenses was kind of a slap in the face. In spite of this we wanted to stick with the original manufacturer of the machines for calibration services so we switched to calibrating our machines every other year, alternating machines, so a tech was in annually to calibrate one machine one year and the next year the other. There was now a two year calibration cycle on our CMM's but we felt like the cost/risk benefit was within our tolerance.

Unfortunately it also seems like the quality of both communication and the calibration techs has gone down the past couple of years as well, at least those they send to our area. We had an issue of a tech really not seeming to know what he was doing - always on the phone working through the calibration process, taking significantly longer, and when he was done had screwed something up that required a more experienced tech to then make the trip to fix it. 

With all of this in mind company ownership opted to get a third party CMM calibration service in this year. It went smoothly and the tech was very knowledgeable and the cost was significantly cheaper. I had significant reservations about moving away from Zeiss for our calibration services but the cost was becoming prohibitive for our smaller shop and the risk of a bad calibration tech showing up was becoming a real possibility. Thankfully this outside tech was able to calibrate the CMM without any problems and was pleasant to work with but if there is a larger issue that requires significant adjustments or hardware fixes we'll still plan to rely on Zeiss.

I would be curious if others have had similar experiences. I have worked with many Zeiss techs over the years and many were great but the past couple of years were rough.

Edited 16 hours ago

[[Ja...]]

Link to a couple of older posts with some more details, this seems to have been an issue for a while:

 

[[Ke...]]

Got in this morning to an email from Zeiss. They now have a technician available that meets our machine calibration due date 🤔

I'll definitely be putting in yearly reminders to get quotes 8 months in advance.

I've never had a problem with Zeiss service, before. 

Regarding technicians: Years ago, I used to see the same technicians, annually. I appreciated that consistance. For at least the last 5 years, I have seen a new face almost every time. I'm sure that they have been trying to do more with less.

[[DW...]]

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 Your observations are shared throughout the Zeiss CMM community. A recent Zeiss tech told me blatantly "we make less money than you probably think we do." It sounds like the compensation on Zeiss' end is lackluster to acquire/keep talent, while also charging a premium for their service. The eventuality of their customers looking for other options should be no surprise to them. Perhaps they changed their business strategy to focus solely on the larger accounts, and let the smaller shops attrit naturally. For most businesses, 80% of the revenue comes from just 20% of the customer base. It would be interesting to hear on this forum from actual Zeiss employees about the current culture at the company.