Last Updated on November 19, 2022 by maximosecrets

Service Groups and their Service Codes are used across several Maximo applications. As such they form the backbone for analysis of performance in Service Management. They are the high-level services being provided.

For example, the IT network is slow in a particular area, or it is too hot in the top floors of a building, these examples might result in increased calls to a service desk, a service request in Maximo. If the service group and service code are added to the service request then it is copied through to all the follow-on tickets (incidents and problems) or work orders, activities, changes, and releases. This allows a greater degree of analysis to be performed into the cause and effect which is key to service management and analysis into the performance of the various teams providing the service.

Service Groups

The Service Groups application will be found in the Service Level module. It provides a two-level hierarchy of Service Groups with Service Codes as its children. It is built on the same table as Commodity Groups and Commodity Codes that you find in the inventory and procurement applications of Maximo. It exists at the Item Set level, it does not have an OrganizationA structural element of a Maximo database which is used for data sharing and is often aligned to a legal entity of an organisation. More or SiteA structural element of a Maximo database that is used for data separation. More identifier.

A Service Group/Service Code is a service that you provide within your organization, for example the maintenance department provides services for the operations department. A Service Group/Service Code has a Service Type of PROVIDE, or BOTH if you will also procure those services, i.e. you intend to create Service Items.

When a Commodity Group/Code is marked as a service it will be given a Service Type of PROCURE and will appear in the Service Groups application. It can be used as a Service Group for which you provide services by changing the Service Type to BOTH.

If a record that you see in the Service Groups application has a type of PROCURE, I would not call this a Service Group, a better term is a Service Commodity Group. If the record has a Service Type of PROVIDE or BOTH then this should rightly be called a Service Group.

Service Groups have a code and description and a Service Type of either PROVIDE or BOTH. If the Service Group will be used in the inventory and procurement applications of Maximo and you aim to create Service Items for it, then you should use the Service Type of BOTH, i.e. the Service Group is used for both service provision and service procurement. If you are unsure, then set initially to PROVIDE as you can later change to BOTH. If you change the Service Type on the Service Group, then all the children will be changed to the new value.

When creating children Service Codes, they will have the same Service Type as their parent Service Group. Both levels can have a Contact Group or Contact, a contact group is a Person Group. The two fields are mutually exclusive either you have a Contact Group or Contact but not both.

Service Group Associations

You can associate Service Groups and Service Codes with multiple asset types, assets or locationsA physical place where assets exist and where work can be performed. More using the Associate Assets/Locations action. Think of these associations as the assets, locations, or asset types that provide a service.

When you use the Associate Services action from the Assets and Locations application only the Service Group and Services of type PROVIDE, or BOTH can be selected. The two actions populate the same table. Maximo does not stop you from creating an association to a location, asset or asset type for a Service Group or Service that has a Service Type of PROCURE, but it is not beneficial to do so.

View Related Records

The Service Group and Service fields will be found in the applications for all classes of tickets and work orders, and they are copied as follow-up records are created. The following crossover domains are being used when a follow-up record is created:

• TCKT2TCKT is used when creating one type of ticket from another
• WO2WO is used when creating one type of work order from another
• TICKET2WO is used when creating a work order from a type of ticket
• WO2TCKT is used when creating a ticket from a type of work order

The two fields also appear in the Service Level Agreements application where they are used for filtering SLAs during the matching process to tickets or work orders. It is important that these two fields are entered on the Service Request or Work Order Tracking application if you are going to use them for matching to SLAs.

With the Service Group application’s action ‘View Related Records for Service Group’ you start to see the extent to which service groups and their service codes are used in Maximo. At the top of the dialog is a radio button with two options:

• View Related Records for the Service Group will only show the records where the service group is referenced on the object without a service code.
• View Related Records for the Service Group and Services will show all records related to the service group whether they have an associated service code or not.

When the radio button ‘View Related Records for the Service Group’ is used the filter on the Service field is ~NULL~ which is interpreted by Maximo as ‘is null’. For those of you who configure Maximo this is a useful reference to remember.

If you look at the Details menu on a Service, there is an action ‘View Related Record for Service’ whose dialog has a similar set of tabs. There is help text at the top of both dialogs which appears out of context. This is because the same dialog appears in the Details menu of the Service Group and Service fields on a ticket or a work order, and in these applications the dialogs allow you to relate records.

Service Groups and Services are related to approved Purchase Contracts by using the action Associate Commodities. This action will also be found on Lease/Rental Contract, Master Contracts, but not Warranty Contracts or Labor Rate Contracts.

The View Related Records dialog also has tabs for Assets and Locations, Asset Types and Configuration Items. For Configuration Items this is the Associated Service for which configuration and change management is performed.

Relate Tickets and Work Orders by Service Groups and Services

On the Service Requests application and similarly for all applications based on the ticket or work order classes, the Details menu on a Service Group or Service field will give access to the same dialogs but with the addition of one or two buttons below the table window, Relate Records, and Relate Records to Global Issue.

This allows you to relate records based on them having a match by Service Group and/or Service, after relating them they will appear in the Related Records tab. The ‘Relate Records To Global Issue’ button only appears if the current ticket record has been marked as a Global Issue, it does not appear on a work order based application.