Work equipment under PUWER 1998
What does industrial machinery repair cost?
There is no honest price list for machinery repair: a bearing change on a conveyor and a drive fault on a five-axis machining centre are not the same job, and anyone quoting a flat rate before seeing the machine is guessing. What we can tell you is exactly what moves the number, breakdown or planned, on-site or workshop, catalogue parts or obsolete ones, normal hours or nights. Tell us about the machine and relevant repair specialists will quote you their actual price.
What happens next
- Tell us about the machine, the fault, how urgent it is and when an engineer can get to it. Two minutes, no account.
- We pass your details to machinery repair specialists covering your postcode, and to no one else.
- They contact you directly with their price for your machine. Compare, choose, or walk away.
Machinery Repair Quotes is a free introduction service operated by Ellul Solutions Ltd; we pass your details to relevant machinery repair specialists who quote you directly. We may receive a fee from providers; you pay nothing and are under no obligation. We are not a repair company, we are not affiliated with the Health and Safety Executive, and nothing here is legal or engineering advice. We publish cost drivers rather than prices because machinery repair is too varied for a published price range to be honest.
What drives an industrial machinery repair price, 2026
Last updated
Machinery repair covers everything from a coupling change to a rebuilt spindle, so a single price range would mislead more than it helps. This is the cost-driver table instead: what actually moves the number on a quote, why it moves it, and the line you should ask for in writing so two quotes can be compared like for like.
We do not publish a price range for machinery repair because the work is too varied for one to be honest: the same fault on two machines can differ by an order of magnitude depending on parts availability and access. This table lists the drivers repairers price against, compiled from the way industrial repair quotations are normally structured (callout, labour, parts, transport, out-of-hours premium). The PUWER points are the legal duties that sit behind the work, not pricing rules. Get quotes for your actual machine via the form above.
| Cost driver | Why it moves the price | What to ask for in the quote |
|---|---|---|
| Breakdown vs planned work | A breakdown pulls an engineer off a route at short notice and pays for diagnosis on site. Planned work is scheduled, so the same hours are bought at a calmer rate. | A callout charge, an hourly rate once on site, and where the boundary between the two sits |
| On-site vs workshop repair | A workshop has lifting gear, clean space and test facilities, so the repair itself is often better and quicker. Against that you pay for strip-out, transport both ways and reinstallation. | Both routes priced separately, with transport and lifting shown as their own lines |
| Mechanical failure vs control system fault | A worn bearing is parts plus labour and can be estimated. A fault in the drive, PLC or safety circuit is diagnostic time first, which is skilled work with an open-ended top end. | Diagnostic time capped at an agreed number of hours, with findings reported before repair work starts |
| Parts: catalogue, refurbished or made | Current catalogue parts have a price and a lead time. Obsolete parts mean hunting used spares, adapting a modern equivalent, or having the part measured and manufactured. This is the single biggest swing in most quotes. | For each part: whether it is new, refurbished or to be manufactured, and the lead time for each option |
| Machine age, size and access | Older and heavier machines take longer to strip. Seized fasteners, missing drawings, restricted access and the need for lifting plant or a second engineer all add hours before anything is repaired. | Whether access equipment, lifting and a second pair of hands are inside the price or extra |
| Time of attendance | Nights, weekends and bank holidays carry premium labour rates. A slot booked into a planned shutdown usually buys the same work at the lowest rate available. | The out-of-hours multiplier in writing, and the exact time of day it starts applying |
| How much the downtime is costing you | Your downtime cost is not the repairer's cost, but it should change what you buy. Same-day attendance, a temporary workaround or a hired-in replacement can each be worth more than the cheapest repair. | A realistic attendance time, plus the price and expected life of a temporary fix if one is possible |
| The report you get afterwards | PUWER 1998 requires work equipment to be maintained in an efficient state and in efficient working order, and where machinery has a maintenance log, that the log is kept up to date. A repair with no paperwork leaves that duty half done. | A written report listing parts fitted, readings taken and any further work identified, in a form you can file |
- Machinery repair has no meaningful single price range: parts availability, on-site versus workshop working and attendance time move the same job by more than any regional variation does.
- Regulation 5 of the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 requires work equipment to be maintained in an efficient state, in efficient working order and in good repair, and requires a machine's maintenance log, where one exists, to be kept up to date.
- The largest avoidable swing in a machinery repair quote is obsolete parts: sourcing used spares, adapting an equivalent or having a component manufactured are three very different prices for the same repair.
Cite this page
“What drives an industrial machinery repair price, 2026”, Machinery Repair Quotes, https://machineryrepairquotes.co.uk/ (updated 2026-08-14). We do not publish a price range for machinery repair because the work is too varied for one to be honest: the same fault on two machines can differ by an order of magnitude depending on parts availability and access. This table lists the drivers repairers price against, compiled from the way industrial repair quotations are normally structured (callout, labour, parts, transport, out-of-hours premium). The PUWER points are the legal duties that sit behind the work, not pricing rules. Get quotes for your actual machine via the form above.
Read next
Every figure sourced and dated.
Machinery repair cost: what actually drives the price
Why industrial machinery repair has no price list, the drivers that move a quote (parts, access, attendance time, diagnosis), and how to make two quotes comparable.
Machinery maintenance logs: what PUWER expects you to keep
What a machinery maintenance log should contain, what PUWER 1998 requires on maintenance and inspection records, and why repair reports matter as much as the repair.
Breakdown repair vs planned maintenance: the real trade-off
Why the same machinery work costs more as a breakdown than as planned maintenance, what a planned contract should include, and when reactive repair is the right call.
The questions we get
How much does industrial machinery repair cost?
There is no honest single figure. The price is built from engineer hours, the rate those hours are charged at, parts, and transport or lifting, and only the rate is knowable before someone has seen the machine. Ask each repairer for a rate card (callout, hourly rate, out-of-hours multiplier, travel) plus an estimate with its assumptions stated, then compare on those. Our cost-driver table above sets out everything that moves the number.
Why will you not publish machinery repair prices?
Because the range is so wide that a published figure would be wrong for most readers, and a wrong number is worse than no number. A coupling replacement on a conveyor and a spindle rebuild on a machining centre are both machinery repair. We publish the cost drivers instead, and get you quotes for the actual machine.
What does PUWER require for machinery maintenance?
Regulation 5 of the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 requires work equipment to be maintained in an efficient state, in efficient working order and in good repair, and requires that where machinery has a maintenance log, the log is kept up to date. Regulation 6 requires inspection, with records, where safety depends on how the equipment was installed or where it deteriorates in service. PUWER sets no repair prices and no fixed repair intervals.
Can machinery be repaired on site, or does it have to go to a workshop?
Both routes exist and they price very differently. On site avoids strip-out, transport and reinstallation but limits what can be done with the machine in place. A workshop offers lifting, clean conditions and test facilities, which often produces a better repair for less labour once the unit is on the bench. Ask for both priced separately and compare the totals.
What if the parts for my machine are obsolete?
Obsolete parts are the biggest single swing in a machinery repair quote. There are usually three routes: a used or refurbished unit, adapting a current equivalent, or having the component measured and manufactured. They differ in price, lead time and risk, so ask the repairer to price each one rather than accepting a single line that hides which route they assumed.
How quickly can someone attend a machinery breakdown?
That depends on the repairer's workload, your distance from their base and whether you hold a contract with a defined response time. Ask for a realistic attendance window rather than a best case, and ask what a temporary workaround would cost if the full repair needs parts on lead time. If production is stopped, attendance speed is often worth more than the hourly rate.