Overall, elevators are a safe and reliable mode of transportation for your tenants and their visitors. But, as with all mechanical systems, major problems can develop. Possibilities include expensive emergency repairs, excessive downtimes, unhappy tenants, code violations, fines and legal liability. Such problems can be avoided with some understanding, thought and strategic planning, and it is literally good business to do so.

Why Regular Maintenance

• Best practice is to keep your elevator up-time as high as possible by arranging for regularly-scheduled service to keep you on top of things. Continuously monitoring performance of your system can minimize the frequency of costly emergency service calls and limit reputation-damaging inconvenience to tenants. Above all, it is the best way to spot and correct issues before they lead to potentially dangerous and disruptive shutdowns.
• In the event of a sudden breakdown, your regular maintenance partner will be familiar with the particulars of your system and the parts and service needed to quickly and most cost-efficiently restore your elevator to service.
• Even well-maintained systems will age and eventually require a modernization. Your maintenance partner can help you do this in the least impactful and most cost-effective way, including the structuring of a phased modernization over a period of 3 to 5 years.

Top Tips 

Here are some common things to watch for and actions to take:

• Periodically ride your elevators. If between regular service calls you see, hear or feel obvious signs that something is going wrong, your maintenance partner can be immediately called in to head problems off at the pass. If you see your elevator stopping above or below the floor level, this is a dangerous tripping hazard that needs to be eliminated. Further, in New York City it is a violation of DOB code that requires elevators to stop accurately and consistently
• Year-round, check your car-side and hall-side door tracks and keep them free of debris that can compromise door operation. This becomes especially necessary during the winter season, when ice, mud and holiday tree needles can clog the tracks
• In advance of a service call, check the phone lines, making sure they are operable with a 24/7 monitoring station

And two “common sense” reminders:

• Avoid violations and fines by keeping your machine room clean, where it is required that only elevator equipment be stored
• Address needed repair work as soon as possible. Waiting until it develops into a disruptive emergency can become needlessly costly in dollars and tenant dissatisfaction.

D&D Will Help

The dollar costs of a regular elevator maintenance program are typically significantly lower than those associated with financing a poorly-maintained, deteriorating system that becomes increasing likely to fail.

If D&D is already your elevator maintenance partner, we can review your current plan to make sure it is up-to-date and best meeting your current needs. Consider having D&D come in for a free, no-obligation evaluation and quotation.

Call our friendly team at (914) 347-4344

At D&D, our primary operating principle is to function as a supportive resource for our family of customers: the region’s building owners and managers. Our objective is to keep you always up-to-date with the latest code requirements, along with practical, cost-efficient solutions to help avoid elevator problems, violations, costly fines, and possible legal liabilities. The ultimate goal is to promote the best possible experience for the public that rides the elevators and the technicians who service them.

Urgent Alert re: Elevator Door Lock Compliance

Several years ago, the New York City Department of Buildings (NYC DOB) announced that – by January 1, 2020 – all "automatic passenger and freight elevators must provide a system to monitor and prevent automatic operation with faulty door contact circuits," meaning the installation of a Door Lock Monitoring system. 

While that deadline has long since passed, and many properties have been upgraded accordingly, there remain numerous buildings that still must be brought into compliance. Maybe it was just overlooked, maybe it was “put off” because there was too much else going on, or perhaps it was a budgetary issue. Whatever the reason, remaining out of compliance can have serious and even dangerous consequences. D&D will work with you, including regarding financial issues, to help make the necessary changes, bring the building into compliance while improving passenger safety. During these discussions, some issues that may need to be considered are:

• Elevators installed or modernized prior to 2015 will require updates to software and possibly hardware
• Controllers installed or modernized after July 1, 2015 may already be partially compliant but may require installation of additional hardware or software
• Elevators installed or modernized after January 2, 2015 may have the equipment to be made fully compliant but may need hardware or software installed
• If the currently-installed controller cannot be adapted with hardware or software upgrades, some level of modernization may be required

All modifications and/or software changes to the controller will require filing with the NYC Department of Buildings, with inspection and testing upon completion, with which D&D can also assist.

Get a Grip on an Upcoming Code Change

If yours is a traction based elevator system using hoist ropes, and it has a single plunger machine brake, it will need to be upgraded. By 2027 it will be mandated by code to equip the system with a Rope Gripper, a device designed to safeguard passengers by stopping the elevator in the event of a mechanical and/or electrical failure. It can additionally detect an emergency situation when a car leaves a floor with an open door, over-speed and other unintended car movement, and failure of the brake, control or drive.

More specifically, Rope Grippers will be required by NYC Building Code 2.19.2 and 2.8.4.1 Appendix K, and elevators without them will be considered non-compliant. While the deadline of 2027 may be several years in the future, it would be best practice to think ahead and do the upgrade before then. Not only would this make for a safer elevator system sooner rather than later, the work can be done on a planned, phased schedule, with an eye on annual budgets, and, above all, to avoid a costly last-minute rush job in an environment of sudden high demand.

D&D Will Help!

In the interest of being proactive, D&D is identifying the properties requiring support with either or both of these issues and will be reaching out to the owners and managers of those that do. We will work with you to plan accordingly, especially if you were financially impacted by recent events. We’re here for you – to discuss, devise and execute a custom plan that’s best for your situation! In the meanwhile, call our friendly team at (914) 347-4344 with any questions or thoughts you’d like to discuss.

About one year ago, we all encountered an extraordinary moment in time when Covid-19 caused life as we knew it to suddenly shut down. We at D&D took this as a challenge: to do all we could to ensure that your elevators would not.

We were determined to continue fulfilling D&D’s purpose and mission: to provide our family of customers with the highest degree of safety, reliability, service and peace-of-mind with regard to their elevators, even in this most difficult of environments. And now, together, we’ve made it through the year and Spring is upon us. The communal mood is improving and the future is appearing a good deal brighter. So, after a quick look back, here is an optimistic look forward at a number of important ways you can prepare for the future as we begin to evolve into the post-Covid world.

During the past year, without interruption, we remained open for business without any change to our hours of operation. Our responsiveness to emergencies continued as usual, with our mechanics strictly following safety guidelines and wearing protective gear as prescribed by the Center for Disease Control and N.Y. State. And, now, we reaffirm our strong commitment to these standards as we work our way toward the eventual wind-down of the pandemic, with the wellbeing of you, your property, your tenants, their visitors and the mechanics always front-and-center in whatever we do.

Tips for the Months Ahead

• Now is an ideal time to address any outstanding violations that need to be removed, especially if they involve issues of safety, reliability, and, ultimately, tenant satisfaction.
  
  
• Consider an upgrade to your lobby and cab aesthetics, to remain competitive in the rapidly-evolving real estate market
  
  
• In a similar vein, consider upgrades using technologies that support passenger safety while enhancing your property’s reputation and market value. New technologies are rapidly emerging, alongside already-available approaches such as HEPA and UV air filtration and sterilization, touchless buttons, voice-controlled operation and more. D&D currently offers several such solutions to its customers, which you can see by going HERE
  
  
• Consider providing signage in lobbies, cabs and on landings, promoting safe passenger behavior (masking, distancing, avoiding conversation, self-limiting the number of passengers, loading in a checkerboard pattern). You can work with your tenants to stagger arrival and departure times to help avoid crowded cabs.
  
  
• Toward this same end, if yours is a multi-elevator property, consider upgrading to a system that monitors and controls elevator traffic based on time-of-day and prevailing conditions:
  
  • Destination Dispatch: an optimization technique in which passengers heading to the same destinations use the same elevators, thereby reducing cab crowding, waiting and travel times
  • Lobby Boost: Uses destination dispatching only in the lobby

We miss you and eagerly look forward to the day when we’ll once again be able to see each other face-to-face: at conventions, outings and social occasions, over a meal or cocktail, and visits at your place of business. In the meanwhile…

Talk To Us – We Can Help!

Chat with our friendly team about how we can assist you in being properly prepared for the times to come. Call (914) 347-4344 for a free, no-obligation review!

Bob	Michael	Nunzio
and the D&D Team