How to Configure Maintenance Stages and Teams in Odoo 18

Running a manufacturing plant without a structured maintenance workflow is like flying blind. At SteelCraft Industries, a mid-sized metal fabrication company with 45 machines spread across three production floors, equipment breakdowns used to cost them roughly $12,000 per incident in lost production time. Their maintenance requests lived in spreadsheets, email threads, and sticky notes on the shop floor manager's desk. Nobody knew which technician was handling what, and preventive maintenance schedules were constantly missed.

After switching to Odoo 18's Maintenance module, SteelCraft set up custom maintenance stages and organized their technicians into specialized teams. Within two months, unplanned downtime dropped by 35%, and the maintenance manager could finally see every active request, its current status, and which team member owned it. This guide walks through exactly how they configured it, so you can replicate the same setup for your own operations.

Why Maintenance Stages and Teams Matter

Before diving into the configuration, it helps to understand what problems these features solve. A maintenance stage represents a step in the lifecycle of a repair or service request. A maintenance team groups the people responsible for carrying out that work. Together, they bring structure to what is otherwise a chaotic process.

Part 1: Setting Up Maintenance Stages

Maintenance stages define the workflow path that every repair request follows. Odoo 18 ships with four default stages, but you can customize them or add new ones to match your process. At SteelCraft, they added two extra stages to handle parts ordering and quality verification.

Accessing the Stages Configuration

Navigate to the stages setup screen:

You will see a list showing every stage along with its settings. Click the View button next to any stage to inspect or modify it, or click New to create a fresh stage.

Understanding Stage Configuration Fields

Each maintenance stage has several key settings that control how it behaves within the workflow:

Field	Purpose	When to Enable
Stage Name	Label displayed on the kanban column header	Always required
Sequence	Determines column order from left to right (lower numbers appear first)	Always required
Folded in Maintenance Pipe	Collapses the kanban column so completed requests do not clutter the view	Use for final stages like Repaired or Scrap
Request Confirmed	Marks the maintenance as confirmed; if the request type is "work center," the system automatically blocks that work center on the production calendar	Typically enabled on all active stages
Request Done	Flags the request as successfully completed in dashboards and reports	Only on completion stages like Repaired

SteelCraft's Stage Configuration

Here is the exact stage setup that SteelCraft Industries uses across their three production floors:

Creating a New Stage Step by Step

To add a custom stage like "Awaiting Parts":

1. Open Maintenance > Configuration > Maintenance Stages
2. Click the New button at the top of the list
3. Enter the stage name: Awaiting Parts
4. Set the Sequence number to position it correctly (e.g., 3 to place it after "In Progress")
5. Check Request Confirmed so the work center stays blocked while parts are on order
6. Leave Request Done unchecked since the work is not finished yet
7. Leave Folded in Maintenance Pipe unchecked so the team can see pending-parts requests
8. Click Save

Part 2: Configuring Maintenance Teams

Maintenance teams group your technicians by specialization. Instead of assigning individual repair requests to individual people, you assign them to a team. The team lead or members then pick up tasks based on availability and expertise. At SteelCraft, they run three teams that cover different equipment categories.

Navigating to Team Configuration

The list view shows all existing teams with their members and associated company. Click New to create a team.

SteelCraft's Team Structure

Team Name	Members	Responsibility
CNC & Machining	David Park, Lisa Chen	All CNC lathes, milling machines, and precision cutting equipment
Hydraulics & Welding	Marco Rossi, Ana Torres, James Wright	Hydraulic presses, welding stations, and pneumatic tools
Electrical & Controls	Priya Sharma	PLC programming, electrical panels, motor drives, and sensor calibration

Creating a New Maintenance Team

1. Open Maintenance > Configuration > Maintenance Team
2. Click New to add an inline row
3. Type the team name (e.g., CNC & Machining)
4. In the Team Members column, select users from the dropdown. You can add multiple members.
5. If your instance runs multiple companies, pick the correct Company
6. Click Save

The newly created team will show up on the Maintenance module dashboard. Each team card on the dashboard displays live counters for pending requests, scheduled maintenance, and in-progress work.

Part 3: Creating and Managing Maintenance Requests

With stages and teams in place, creating maintenance requests becomes straightforward. Here is how SteelCraft's floor supervisors submit requests and how their technicians process them.

Submitting a New Maintenance Request

Fill in the request form with these details:

Field	Example Value	Notes
Request Title	Hydraulic Press #3 Cylinder Leak	Be descriptive so the team knows what to expect
Equipment	HP-300 Hydraulic Press	Select from your registered equipment list
Maintenance Type	Corrective	Choose Corrective for breakdowns, Preventive for scheduled upkeep
Maintenance Team	Hydraulics & Welding	Assigns the request to the appropriate specialist group
Scheduled Date	2025-08-15	When the maintenance should happen
Duration	3 hours	Estimated time for the repair

After saving, the request appears in the kanban view under the New Request column. Because "Request Confirmed" is enabled on that stage, the HP-300 Hydraulic Press work center is automatically blocked for 3 hours on August 15th.

Moving Requests Through Stages

There are two ways to advance a request through the workflow:

Part 4: Using the Team Dashboard

The Maintenance module's main dashboard is organized by team. Each team card shows live metrics that update automatically as requests move through stages.

Dashboard Metrics Explained

Metric	What It Shows	Click Action
To Do	Number of open requests assigned to the team that have not been completed	Opens kanban view filtered to this team
Scheduled	Requests with a future maintenance date	Opens calendar view showing the maintenance timeline

At SteelCraft, the maintenance manager checks this dashboard every morning at the 7:30 AM production meeting. If the Hydraulics & Welding team shows "4 To Do" while Electrical & Controls shows "0 To Do," she can temporarily reassign a cross-trained technician to balance the load.

Calendar View for Scheduled Maintenance

Clicking the Scheduled counter on any team card opens a calendar view. Each maintenance request appears as a block on its scheduled date. You can click any calendar entry to open the full request details, or drag entries to reschedule directly from the calendar.

Part 5: Work Center Blocking in Action

One of the most powerful features tied to maintenance stages is automatic work center blocking. When the "Request Confirmed" checkbox is active on a stage, and the maintenance request targets a work center, here is exactly what happens behind the scenes:

1. Request Created: A floor supervisor submits a corrective maintenance request for the CNC Lathe #7 work center, scheduled for next Tuesday at 9 AM for 4 hours.
2. Stage has Request Confirmed: Because the "New Request" stage has this checkbox enabled, Odoo immediately creates a leave entry on the CNC Lathe #7 work center calendar.
3. Production Impact: Any manufacturing orders that were scheduled to use CNC Lathe #7 during that 4-hour window are automatically flagged. The production planner sees the conflict and can reschedule affected orders to other work centers.
4. Maintenance Completed: The technician drags the request to "Repaired." Because this stage has "Request Done" checked, the work center leave is cleared and CNC Lathe #7 becomes available again.
5. Normal Operations Resume: Manufacturing orders can be scheduled on the work center immediately after the maintenance request reaches a done stage.

Best Practices from SteelCraft's Setup

Putting It All Together

Here is the complete workflow that SteelCraft runs every day:

1. Floor supervisor spots an issue with the HP-300 Hydraulic Press and creates a maintenance request
2. The request appears in New Request on the kanban board, assigned to the Hydraulics & Welding team
3. Marco from the team picks it up, opens the request, and drags it to In Progress
4. Marco discovers the cylinder seal needs replacement and the part is not in inventory, so he moves the request to Awaiting Parts
5. Procurement orders the seal. When it arrives, Marco moves the request back to In Progress
6. After replacing the seal and testing the press, Marco drags the request to Repaired
7. The HP-300 work center is automatically unblocked and the production planner schedules the next batch of orders
8. The Repaired column folds, keeping the board clean for the next set of requests