New Army maintenance system goes live at Fort Leonard Wood

By Fort Leonard Wood Public Affairs OfficeApril 28, 2022

(Photo Credit: U.S. Army) VIEW ORIGINAL

FORT LEONARD WOOD, Mo. — The Army Maintenance Activity, or ArMA, expanded to Fort Leonard Wood this week, providing a digitized maintenance request process for all Army-owned facilities with a centralized method of submission and tracking.

All personnel with a “.mil” email address can now create a user account. The new system, which went online here on April 27, is available via the ArMA website and the Digital Garrison app. It is a significant improvement in more ways than one, said Mark Lenox, chief of the Business Operations and Integration Division at the Directorate of Public Works here.

“There are a lot of advantages with ArMA,” Lenox said. “There’s the convenience of it — after the initial registration, which takes just a couple of minutes, personnel here can turn in service requests for their building or Army-owned quarters 24/7. There is no waiting on the phone and you don’t have to repeat your information every time you need to make a request. The system auto-populates all the personal information and all you have to do is write your maintenance request in the remarks section. All of this automation saves time, but having work requests entered through ArMA versus in person or by telephone also saves on manpower costs for DPW.”

Further, Lenox said ArMA allows individuals to track their open maintenance requests, and there is a drop-down menu to check available maintenance services.

The new system also allows users to submit photos with their work orders, Lenox said, which has decreased the average age of a work order by 25 percent at installations already using ArMA.

“By including pictures and being as descriptive as possible when entering work requests, service technicians can show up and resolve issues in as little as one visit,” he said.

The ArMA system debuted in 2021 at Fort Campbell, Kentucky. They are now averaging 250 work order requests each day through the website, said Sean Nickley, engineering systems branch chief at Fort Campbell.

“We’ve seen a pretty significant increase in work orders put in, which we consider a good thing because that means people are out there using the application and seeing what they need fixed,” Nickley said. “We’re able to go assist them and get them the help they need.”

Lenox noted the new system does not apply to on-post military family housing here, which is privatized. Family housing residents requiring assistance should still call the 24/7 maintenance work order request line at 573.329.4000.

Fort Leonard Wood is one of 73 installations managed by U.S. Army Installation Management Command that are scheduled to receive the new service this year, said Doug Enfield, ArMA program manager at Joint Base San Antonio, Texas.

“Automation of the maintenance-customer relationship is at the core of what we are doing,” he said. “Customers expect this.”

Visit the ArMA website to create an account and learn more about the new system.

(Editor’s note: Information included in this article was first published by the U.S. Army Installation Management Command.)