Every trade builds its own shorthand, and facility maintenance has more than most. This page explains the terms that turn up in our quotes, our closeout reports and the conversations property managers have with us, so nothing on an invoice needs decoding.

43 terms, grouped by trade. If something you have been asked about is missing, tell us and we will add it.

Contracting HVAC Refrigeration Electrical Lighting Plumbing Glass Building

Contracting

Contracting terms

COI (certificate of insurance): A one-page document from an insurer confirming a contractor carries active coverage, showing policy limits and dates. Most Miami office towers will not let a technician past the loading dock without one on file, and getting it lodged in advance is the difference between a job happening and a wasted visit. Why buildings ask for one
W-9: The IRS form a business gives a client so the client can report payments made to it. Standard onboarding paperwork for any commercial vendor, and the normal moment to share an EIN. Vendor onboarding questions
EIN (employer identification number): A federal tax identification number issued to a business, functioning much like a social security number does for an individual. Clients ask for it when setting a vendor up for payment. Our business details
Work order: The record of a single job, from the request through to completion. A useful work order identifies the specific asset, what was found, what was done, the parts used and what is recommended next. Reading the invoice that follows
Closeout: The documentation filed when a job finishes. A closeout that says only "repaired unit" cannot support a warranty claim, settle a landlord and tenant dispute, or show that the same asset has now failed three times in a year. What a closeout should contain
SLA (service level agreement): An agreed response time for a given priority of call. A four-hour SLA means a technician is on site within four hours of the request, not that the repair is finished within four. Questions worth asking a vendor
Punch list: The standing list of small outstanding items on a property. Clearing a punch list in one scheduled visit costs far less than calling someone out for each item, because the travel dominates the cost of small jobs. Commercial handyman work
Make-good: Restoring a surface after another trade has opened it up. A plumbing repair inside a wall is only half finished until the drywall is closed, finished and painted back. General maintenance

HVAC

HVAC terms

RTU (rooftop unit): A packaged air conditioning unit mounted on a roof, containing compressor, condenser and air handling in one cabinet. The standard arrangement for retail, restaurant and light industrial buildings across Miami-Dade. Commercial HVAC in Miami
Air handler: The part of a system that moves conditioned air through the ductwork, containing the blower and the evaporator coil. In a split system it sits indoors while the condenser sits outside.
Condenser coil: The outdoor coil that rejects heat from the refrigerant. Coastal Miami properties corrode these faster than the manufacturer schedule assumes, and a fouled or corroded coil forces the compressor to work against high head pressure.
Head pressure: The pressure the compressor works against on the discharge side. Persistently high head pressure, usually from a dirty coil or restricted airflow, is the most common route to a burnt-out compressor. Why coils matter after a storm
Short cycling: Equipment starting and stopping rapidly instead of running a full cycle. Each start draws high current, so a compressor cycling six times an hour will not last as long as one cycling twice. What to check when cooling stops
Condensate line: The drain carrying water away from the evaporator coil. A blocked line is a nuisance overflow in mild weather and a ceiling collapse during a humid Miami August. The tower version of this failure
Preventive maintenance: Scheduled servicing intended to prevent failures rather than react to them. On refrigeration in particular the arithmetic is straightforward, since the stock inside one walk-in is usually worth more than a year of scheduled visits. Building a schedule that gets followed

Refrigeration

Refrigeration terms

Walk-in cooler: A refrigerated room used for bulk food storage. Failures rarely happen without warning, and the early signals are usually a door that has stopped sealing or a condenser nobody has cleaned. Commercial refrigeration
Door gasket: The flexible seal around a refrigeration door. Cheap, dull, and behind a surprising share of compressor failures, because a unit running continuously to compensate for a leaking door eventually gives up. The signs before a failure
Temperature log: The record of readings taken from refrigerated equipment. Required for health department files, and genuinely predictive: a slow upward drift across several weeks is what a failure looks like before it happens. What to record, and why
Temperature danger zone: The band between roughly 41 and 135 degrees Fahrenheit, where bacteria multiply fastest in food. Refrigeration exists to keep product below it and hot holding to keep product above it, so an excursion into the zone is what a health inspector is really looking for in a log.
Blast chiller: Equipment that pulls cooked product down through the temperature danger zone quickly, in a window set by food safety rules. A unit that still gets cold but no longer chills fast enough is a compliance failure even though nothing looks broken. Production refrigeration in Hialeah
Defrost cycle: The programmed period when an evaporator is warmed to clear accumulated ice. Set for the wrong load or defeated by a failed heater, it produces ice build-up that gets blamed on the refrigeration rather than the control.
Refrigerant leak: Gradual loss of charge from a sealed system. Performance declines slowly rather than stopping, so the compressor works harder for months before anyone notices, which is why leak detection belongs on a scheduled visit. Spotting one early

Electrical

Electrical terms

Panel: The enclosure distributing electrical supply through a building via circuit breakers. Plenty of older Miami commercial space runs panels sized for far lighter loads than the current tenant imposes. Commercial electrical
Dedicated circuit: A circuit serving one piece of equipment and nothing else. Commercial kitchen equipment, IT rooms and signage generally need one, and sharing a circuit is a common cause of recurring nuisance tripping.
Nuisance tripping: A breaker repeatedly cutting power without an obvious fault. Usually a capacity problem rather than a faulty breaker, which is why replacing the breaker tends to book the same call again a month later. undefined
Three-phase power: A supply arrangement used for larger commercial and industrial equipment. Common through Doral and Hialeah, where losing a phase can stop an entire production or distribution operation. Three-phase work in Doral

Lighting

Lighting terms

Ballast and driver: The components regulating current to a lamp. Fluorescent fittings use a ballast, LED fittings use a driver, and both fail well before the fixture itself does. Lighting maintenance
Group re-lamping: Replacing a whole run of lamps at once rather than individually as each fails. One mobilisation instead of six, and it ends the trickle of complaints from a slowly darkening space. Lot lighting in Kendall
LED retrofit: Converting existing fittings to LED. Payback depends on run hours and electricity rate, so a parking lot burning dusk to dawn pays back far faster than an office lit forty hours a week. Working out the payback
Exit and emergency lighting: Fixtures that illuminate escape routes when power fails. They carry specific testing and record-keeping requirements, and a fire marshal will check them early. 24/7 emergency response
High-bay: A fixture designed for ceilings above roughly twenty feet, typical in warehouses. Replacement is an access problem before it is an electrical one, since it needs a lift and a cleared aisle.

Plumbing

Plumbing terms

Backflow prevention: A device stopping used water being drawn back into the clean supply. Commercial properties are generally required to have these tested on a schedule. Commercial plumbing
Hydro-jetting: Clearing a drain line with high-pressure water rather than a mechanical auger. More thorough on grease-heavy restaurant lines, where a cabled clear often reopens the same blockage within weeks. Grease lines in Wynwood
Grease trap: A vessel intercepting fats and oils before they reach the sewer. Required on commercial kitchens, inspected by the health department, and unpleasant when neglected. What fails, and why
P-trap: The curved section under a fixture that holds standing water and blocks sewer gas from entering the building. A dry trap in a rarely used floor drain is a common source of unexplained smells.

Glass

Glass terms

Tempered glass: Heat-treated safety glass that breaks into blunt granules rather than shards. Standard for most commercial storefront openings. Commercial glass
Laminated glass: Two panes bonded to an interlayer, so the glass holds together when broken. Used where security or impact resistance matters, including hurricane-rated openings.
Board-up: Temporary panelling securing a broken opening until glass can be measured, ordered and fitted. A separate job from the replacement, running on a much shorter clock. What happens in a board-up
Door closer: The mechanism controlling how a door shuts. Across commercial property these generate more service calls than broken glass does, because a door gets used hundreds of times a day.
Impact-rated: Glazing certified to withstand windborne debris, required in parts of South Florida under the building code. Not interchangeable with ordinary tempered glass. Storefront glass Downtown

Building

Building terms

Facility management platform: Software a national client uses to dispatch and track work orders across many sites. Vendors are expected to accept work, post updates and file closeout documentation inside the platform. Choosing a vendor
Multi-tenant: A property let to several occupiers. The first question on any repair is usually administrative rather than technical: whether the fault sits with the structure, the landlord or the tenant. Who pays for what
Tenant improvement: Alterations fitting a space to an incoming occupier. Frequently needs electrical capacity, lighting layout and plumbing changes together, which is where a single vendor saves the most scheduling. Fit-outs in converted buildings

Commercial maintenance glossary