Glossary
Mean time to repair
Mean time to repair (MTTR) is the average time it takes to return failed equipment to service once a repair is underway, calculated by dividing total repair downtime by the number of repairs completed in a period.
The inputs.
- Benchmark
- None. There is no universal figure; track it against your own baseline.
Why MTTR matters for commercial contractors
On commercial and mechanical accounts, MTTR is the number behind how fast a customer's facility gets back to normal — a rooftop unit or chiller that's down is disrupting the customer's business, not just yours. It's also the repair-time component of the resolution windows written into SLAs, which means a slow MTTR shows up as missed SLA compliance before it shows up as a customer complaint. And because it's measured from the repair, it's the honest complement to how long the equipment runs in the first place.
What drives mean time to repair down
The biggest drags are usually parts availability — a repair that pauses waiting on a part can double or triple MTTR even with a good technician — followed by skill-to-job matching at dispatch and diagnostic accuracy from equipment service history. A technician who arrives with the right part and a clear history of the unit fixes it in one pass. MTTR is less about working faster and more about showing up ready to finish.
Where it lives, and what to read with it
Work order status changes — dispatched, traveling, on site, in progress, complete — are timestamped as the technician works, so per-repair duration and MTTR roll up per equipment record, technician, and branch without a separate time log. The equipment record carries prior service history into the visit, and the dispatch board surfaces suggested technician matches by location and skill, which is where the readiness to finish the job is decided.
Straight answers.
How is mean time to repair different from response time?
Response time is the clock from a request until a technician arrives on site. MTTR starts when the repair itself begins and runs until the equipment is back in service — so response time is about getting there, and MTTR is about getting it fixed.
Does MTTR include time spent waiting on parts?
It depends on how you define the repair window. If the clock runs from the start of the repair to the equipment back in service, then yes — which is exactly why parts availability is the lever that moves MTTR most.
What's a good mean time to repair benchmark?
There's no single defensible figure — it varies by equipment class, failure type, and how much on-site diagnosis is required. Track it as a trend against your own baseline rather than chasing a published number.
How is MTTR related to first-time fix rate?
A repair that takes two visits is both a high-MTTR event and a first-time-fix miss. The two metrics are driven by the same inputs — parts readiness and diagnostic accuracy on the first visit.