Satisfaction with the customer service provided by wind power manufacturers has sunk to an all-time low. In the German Wind Energy Association’s annual service survey only Enercon scored well. Independent service providers became more important in 2006.
Pitch-Motoren auf dem Prüfstand: Ein Service-Monteur kontrolliert die Blattverstellung in der Turbine.
Wind power manufacturers once again had every reason to celebrate in 2006. The global market grew by 30%, more than €15 billion were invested in the wind turbine business. Companies were producing at full capacity, their order books fi lled cover to cover for the next two years. The stock market rewarded all the wind industry success with fat gains. In a takeover scramble for German company Repower Systems AG nuclear corporation Areva and Indian wind turbine maker Suzlon were upping the stakes to outbid each other.
But the growth euphoria isn’t really catching on with operators. While manufacturers see their turbines sprouting like mushrooms all over the planet, the day-to-day grind for wind power producers includes long waiting times for spare parts and they complain about poor communication with the service departments. The mediocre ratings compiled in the annual service survey conducted by the German Wind Energy Association (Bundesverband WindEnergie – BWE) reflect dissatisfaction. "To a great extent the results have gotten worse even though the makers vowed to improve after last year’s survey," says Klaus Öhlbüttel, Head of the BWE’s technology division.
Of eight turbine producers only Enercon was rated "good" by the turbine owners. Most of the companies had to make do with a grade of "three minus". The survey uses the German school grading system in which 1 is best, six worst. Global giant General Electric even got a chastising "adequate". The so-so quality of service is a burning issue for operators – refl ected by the higher participant turnout. A total of 650 BWE operators fi lled out 1,139 questionnaire forms (compared to 941 questionnaires the previous year). That’s a 32% return rate. The quality of service work on 3,679 wind turbines was evaluated (compared to 2,845 turbines in the 2005 survey).
Independent service providers, on the other hand, came away with good scores. Their significance is continuously growing. A good 10% of the questionnaires evaluated third-party providers. Two companies whizzed with a "very good" ranking. The rest for the`most part can be pleased about their "good" marks. "It’s good news that the independent service companies are gradually getting established," says technology expert Öhlbüttel. A noteworthy point, he adds, is the fact that third-party companies now no longer only look after older turbines, but also machines in the 1.5-MW class.
For manufacturers it means stronger competition. And what’s more, customers’ willingness to switch is increasing. Amongst the Nordex and Dewind operators nearly 40% are looking for a new provider. With GE it’s almost 60% – three times the 2005 fi gure. It’s high time for manufacturers to improve customer satisfaction. After the previous survey most of them had promised to make amends. Departments were to be restructured and service organisations decentralised to shorten travel times and waits for spare parts. But such changes "don’t seem to have made their way to operators yet", says Öhlbüttel.
The way operators see it, service continues to exist in the shadows. "Manufacturers continue to concentrate more on new business and exporting than on the upkeep of turbines," criticises Hans-Heinrich Andresen, Chairman of the BWE operators committee. The companies had made a lot of promises but not much of that could be seen in practice, he says.
Aurich-based wind power manufacturer Enercon is a good example of how to do things differently. "The supply of spare parts works well and when there are problems the service teams usually arrive at the site in less than half an hour," praises Ulf Winkler, spokesman of the Enercon operators forum. But problems occur only very occasionally, he continues, and the quality of the service work is very good. In turn, customers’ willingness to switch is very low. Only 1.4% of Enercon turbine operators want to switch to an independent service provider. Enercon’s recipe for success is the long-term, full-maintenance contract almost all operators sign up to in what the company calls an Enercon Partner Concept agreement. They have to pay around 12% of their revenues for the full-service package, in return Enercon and its more than 90 service crews see to above-average turbine availability. Bottlenecks for spare parts are also more the exception than the rule. That’s because Enercon makes almost all components itself and so is less impacted than other companies by delivery delays.
2006 Service Survey - The results at a glance.
Enercon is completely unaffected by the wind industry’s greatest problem child. Fault-prone gears just don’t come into play in their machines. Operators of other brands haven’t been so lucky. And sometimes they have to wait months for a geardrive replacement because there’s nothing in stock and the suppliers can’t keep up with demand. To make matters worse, wind turbine operators have been plagued with three wind-weak years and their receipts don’t match expectations.
"Replacement parts sometimes arrive very late and if a turbine is inoperative that costs €1,000 per day," complains vice-spokesman of the BWE’s forum of Nordex operators, Ralf Eikermann. Also, the components are much more expensive from the turbine maker than from sub-contractors, he adds. Now Nordex is promising to improve its spare parts supply. "We introduced a new logistics structure in January. Spare parts, with the exception of large components, ought to be at the turbine within 24 hours," says head of service, Thorsten Kramer.
Nordex is in the process of fundamentally restructuring its service division. No wonder, given the Norderstedt-based company rated worst in the 2004 and 2005 customer service evaluations. "We want to move much closer to the parks," says Kramer about the new decentralised structure. Nordex will divide Germany into six service regions, he says, and put on more technicians. That ought to fulfil one of its turbine operators’ burning wishes: more personal contact with service technicians.
"Operators want regular contact persons and not constantly changing service crews," says BWE operators committee chair Andresen. For the manufacturers it’s not always easy to meet that expectation. The market is humming, exports are increasing. Experienced workers are in demand in many places. Operators of Fuhrländer turbines have felt the consequences. "Fuhrländer grew fast and has lost some of its family feel," says Jörg Konrad, spokesman of the BWE Fuhrländer operators forum.
In previous service surveys the company-based in Waigandsheim garnered praise for its personal support service. This year Fuhrländer operators doled out poorer marks but the company still made it to number three in the manufacturers chart. Operators of older turbines are the most satisfi ed bunch. That comes as no surprise to Fuhrländer company spokesman Walter Lutz. "The crews driving out to the old converters are the service teams who are familiar with the projects," he says. With the newer turbines, by contrast, it’s virtually impossible to always dispatch the same technicians.
Personnel turnover was also a point of criticism for Vestas operators in the past. The Danish company contracted a management consultancy to develop recommendations for better service. "We switched to a decentralised service structure and broke down the responsibilities," explains Hendrik van Ritter, head of service for Vestas Central Europe.
Repower technicians during a visual inspection inside a wind turbine nacelle.
The Hamburg-based company ranked Number Two in the BWE survey
assessing the quality of service provided by German manufacturers.
Vestas service teams are now responsible for selected turbines. "We welcome the changes," says spokesman of the BWE Vestas operators forum, Brar Riewerts. The structural improvements, however, haven’t yet raised survey results. In 2006 Vestas got a "three minus" – just like in 2005. "The structures have changed but that hasn’t made its way into all the heads of the people in charge," says Riewerts in an effort to explain the mediocre rating.
He cites Vestas operators still complaining that the technicians aren’t working fl exibly enough on site. And frequently minor occur rences were cause for displeasure. For instance when one operator’s control computer hard drive broke down he not only had to pay for the new drive, but also for new software. "Just small fry, yes, but it’ssymptomatic of things just not running smoothly," says forum spokesman Riewerts.
Van Ritter urges operators to be patient and promises that the new service structure will kick in this year. "We’re not there yet, but we’re moving in the right direction," says the Vestas service director. In future more spare parts are to be stocked in the regional service stations, he says. But that’s all the detail he’ll divulge about the new logistics concept to be put in place this year.
Repower Systems AG made over its service. Locations were further decentralised and service workers assigned to specifi c customers. According to the company based in Hamburg their efforts will be doubly worthwhile. "For one, we want to get our travel times to the turbines to less than two hours," says fi nance and service director, Pieter Wasmuth. "And secondly the fi xed assignments will raise personal sense of responsibility and in turn the quality of the maintenance work."
Unlike many of its competitors, Repower already demonstrates no problems with the quality of it service work. Repower operators gave it consistently good scores. In the overall ranking the company once again came second. Not without reason. "We set up a separate engineering department that works exclusively for service and acts as an intermediary to the development division," says Wasmuth.
Manufacturers Ranking
"We also rely on proactive maintenance concepts," say the company’s service director. It’s a strategy that clearly goes down well among operators. "Repower regularly conducts endoscopic examinations of the gears, even in turbines no longer under warranty," reports Angelo Bargel, spokesman of the BWE’s forum of Repower operators. In addition, the company offers retrofits and system control upgrades – not only for its fl eet of Repower turbines, but also for turbines branded by Südwind and Fuhrländer. Cost-performance ratio is the only issue that leaves operators somewhat dissatisfied – a complaint heard throughout the industry.
"Many customers criticised prices last year," says CEO of Siemens Wind Power GmbH, Norbert Giese. That’s refl ected in the survey results for the technology company, which dropped half a grade point in comparison to the previous year. Quality of the service work still gets good marks. "The expertise at Siemens is quite high, both in terms of technicians and the technological departments," says Hans-Heinrich Albertsen, spokesman of the Siemens operators forum at BWE.
But on the topic of costs opinions are divided. "Prices went up while performance remained the same," criticises Albertsen. Siemens also upset wind turbine operators by restating its terms of business. "Siemens wants to rule out following adhesion for its own mistakes which result from plain negligence," says the forum spokesman. For operators that would necessitate buying additional insurance cover.
Siemens CEO Giese advises people not to get carried away. He says there have never been such consequential damages in the past. Besides, discussions with the operators about the contractual terms were still ongoing, he adds. Giese says that the problem of cost also has other sources. "The wind-weak years have left the operators with less money in their pockets."
The problems at Siemens appear almost harmless in comparison to those of arch rival General Electric. For the fi rst time the US corporation rated last in the annual service survey. Operators of GE turbines gave their worst scores for pricing. "Price and performance don’t add up at GE anymore," grumbles operators forum spokesman Claus Marxen. Costs of some spare parts have gone up dramatically, he says, while service has got worse.
From Salzbergen headquarters there came only a brief written statement. "GE was able to maintain constant prices for maintenance work and repairs over the course of six years," it reads. And in 2006 "the increase in energy and personnel costs, along with an announced hike in Value Added Tax" were at least to some extent passed on to customers.
The company refused to answer any further enquiries so it remains a secret among the GE bosses why the VAT increase in 2007 had any impact at all on prices in 2006.
It’s also completely unclear what GE’s service will look like in future. Two years ago the company announced full-maintenance concepts. But in practice there are no full-service agreements to be had – much to the exasperation of operators. "There’s complete mismanagement at GE headquarters," rants BWE forum of GE operators spokesman Marxen. He says the service teams, working on location with the best intentions, also suffer for it. Because they have hardly any decision-making power most of their time is spent consulting and coordinating with headquarters. Due to strict guidelines for procuring tools and spare parts, GE technicians wouldn’t even dare to buy a ballpoint pen on their own, says Marxen.
The upshot of such negative run-ins can be seen in the operators’ high level of willingness to switch – almost 60%. "There’ll be a migration," Marxen predicts.
Many operators of Tacke machines (the Tacke company was taken over by Enron Wind in 1997; following Enron’s bankruptcy it was in turn taken over by General Electric to become GE Wind Energy – Ed.) have already switched to independent providers and now third-party companies are getting ready to see to the upkeep of 1.5-MW turbines, too. Among them, SSB Antriebstechnik GmbH & Co. KG based in Salzbergen will offer complete services for these turbine types regardless of brand. "We’ll fi rst focus on GE turbines," says Helmut Reinke, who works in SBB’s service management and was previously on the payroll of GE. SBB bought in further expertise from his predominant neighbour. Ulrich Schomakers, formerly Director Global Customer Service in the wind energy division of GE Energy, became managing director of SSB on 1 December.
Reinke believes that the turbine makers can no longer cover the service market completely because human resources are invested in new business. "To some extent service ends when the guarantee expires," he says. This is the niche his company targets and he expresses no intention whatsoever to engage in confrontation with manufacturers. Besides, turbine makers have long said they can imagine handing over some of the maintenance work to independent providers. "For me it’s not about all or nothing," says Repower Service Director Wasmuth. Sensitive areas such as system control, however, ought to remain fi rmly in the hands of the makers, he says.
A new player among the non-affi liated service providers is emerging in the form of E Energy Service GmbH, formerly EU Energy Service which before that evolved from the service division of Dewind. In September last year the wind power planning and operating fi rm Enertrag AG bought into the enterprise and is now preparing to take control of the service company. "In future Enertrag will hold more than 75% of the shares of E Energy Service GmbH," says the new managing director, Gerd Kück.
E Energy has already taken over the servicing of GE 1.5-MW turbines and plans to add Repower and Nordex machines. But fi rst Kück’s company has to appease the operators of Dewind turbines – and that’s no easy task. In the service survey E Energy got only an "adequate" stamp of approval and slipped into second last place. "That result refl ects the experiences we’re having," says spokesman of the BWE Dewind operators forum, Andreas Knaf. Particularly the provision of spare parts is full of hiccoughs, he says. Components weren’t kept in stock, he adds, and operators had to endure long waits. The turbine maker, which recently resumed the name Dewind, doesn’t offer any service of its own, even though many operators still hold service agreements with the company.
The problem is that Dewind hesitantly forwards service jobs to E Energy GmbH, which in this case acts as a subcontractor. Gestures of non-contractual goodwill practically no longer exist, for turbines not under warranty operators have to cough up all the money for damages themselves. "As an independent service company we can only accommodate customers out of goodwill for our own services," says Kück. But Enertrag intends to ensure that E Energy has suffi - cient stocks of spare parts in future and that regional bases are positioned in such a way that technicians can get to the turbines within an hour, he says.
"We want to double our stocks," he adds reassuringly. Spare parts are issued directly from the producers, which Kück says keeps prices within reason. And major components, says the managing director, would also be kept in supply. For D4 turbines he says there are always seven replacement gears available. E Energy’s primary goal is to raise the economic availability of the wind turbines. But there’s one thing Kück, who is also director of project implementation on Enertrag’s board of directors, doesn’t at all want for E Energy. "We don’t want to be a cheap supplier. With our concept we stand for optimising turbine availability and you just can’t get that at discount prices."
This article appeared in the Issue 2 / 2007 of new energy and is republished with permission of the authors and publisher.