He’s an NFL rookie. But on this very first day of a new professional football season, the odds-makers would agree that he has a decent chance of becoming the highest scoring player on his team. After all, he’s a placekicker. That’s what placekickers often manage to do.

Deftly positioning the football on the kicking tee, for an instant he’s in charge of getting the season’s first game underway, to the delight of the millions of fans watching in the stadium or from afar. For this rookie, this is the culmination of years of practice. 

Every kickoff has a backstory. And the kickoff of an agreement between a facility owner and an electrical contractor to meet the requirements of NFPA 70B is no exception.

“Electrical contractor” does not appear anywhere between the shiny red covers of the NFPA 70B publication. But it makes sense for most facility owners and managers to seek an EC’s help to establish a program for carrying out their 70B compliance. 

Before day one, every electrical service and maintenance contractor must equip their organization to support customers’ NFPA 70B compliance by acknowledging and meeting certain critical demands.

First, the coverage the contractors provide is all about gathering and preserving data on electrical equipment. Contractors who want to take on this kind of responsibility must possess the wherewithal to manage and secure the data at the heart of it.

Second, electrical service and maintenance contractors who offer support to facility owners for NFPA 70B compliance should look on it as a long-term engagement and prepare their organizations accordingly. For customers and contractors, people come and go. Electrical service and maintenance contractors must be able to respond to that inevitability. As much as possible, they must prevent knowledge from “walking out the door” when someone leaves.

NFPA 70B will always be subject to changes and updates. Three years ago, it rose from being a collection of recommended practices to a strict standard, and its content was reorganized. It has finally attracted serious attention. The committees overseeing it always advertise their intentions to make changes in advance of their enactment, so contractors should perpetually be alert to that possibility.

In keeping with the above demands on contractors, in “Electrical Service and Maintenance Guide to NFPA 70 B&E,” the ELECTRI International task force study calls for four steps in the process of kicking off a maintenance agreement rooted in NFPA 70B.

1. Internal handoff and ownership of the agreement 

A successful kickoff begins with a clear internal handoff. The agreement owner—often a service manager, project manager or lead electrician—must receive the equipment list, documentation gaps, maintenance intervals, safety considerations and customer-specific requirements developed during baseline and planning phases. This structured transfer creates a single point of responsibility and allows the team to start the program with consistency.

2. Build the annual maintenance calendar 

With the necessary information in hand, translate the maintenance program into an annual calendar, identifying when tasks will be performed, grouping work around operational windows and aligning intervals with seasonal or load-­related considerations. A well-­defined calendar lets customers plan, prevents scheduling conflicts, maintains predictable workloads and reinforces maintenance as a structured program rather than isolated tasks.

3. Prepare safety and LOTO requirements

Before work begins, confirm that one-line diagrams are available, labeling is verified and lockout/tagout procedures are understood for each major piece of equipment. Identify tasks requiring controlled energized work and assign only qualified electricians. Thorough safety preparation reduces delays and will reinforce the professionalism of your maintenance offering.

4. Train electricians on documentation expectations 

Electricians must know what to document and how to capture it: test results, inspection notes, environmental observations and deficiencies identified during the maintenance cycle. Documentation should be consistent, clear and aligned with customer expectations. Well-executed records ensure reliable deliverables, support compliance, build trust and lay the groundwork for renewal discussions.

For electrical service and maintenance contractors, engagements to support facility owners in NFPA 70B compliance, when properly performed, have the potential to produce recurring revenues. From the perspective of a high-scoring NFL placekicker, that’s one winning season after another.

Next month’s article will look at the fifth step in the guide: the maintenance cycle.

<< Read part 3 of this series

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