The unplanned time are generally generated by system external causes connected with machineries, production planning and production risks.
A whole production system (e.g. production line) or some equipment may be temporarily used for non marketable product (e.g. prototype), or they may are not supposed to produce, due to test (e.g. for law requirements), installation of new equipments and the related activities (e.g. training of workers).
Similarly, a production system may face idle time because of lack of demand, absence of a production schedule (ineffectiveness of marketing function or production planning activities) or lack of material in stock due to ineffectiveness in managing the orders. Clearly, the presence of a production schedule in a production system is independent by the Operations manager and by the production system design as well. Yet, the lack of stock material, although independent from the production system design is one of the critical responsibility of any OM (inventory management).
Among this set of time losses we find also other external factors that affect the system availability, which are usually managed by companies as a risk. In this sense occurrence of phenomenon like the lack of energy or the presence of strikes are risks that companies well know and that usually manage according to one of the four risk management strategy (avoidance, transfer, mitigation acceptance) depending on their impact and probability.
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