All freight wagons that are transported to date on the public railway network in Europe have to be assigned to an ECM (entity in charge of maintenance).

This particular specification’s background is the control and respective reduction of the risks in correlation with maintenance. The goal is ultimately an increase in railway safety.

In medium term this specification is to be predicted for all other rolling stock (DMU, EMU secondary rolling stock) as well.

Prerequisite in the process of becoming an ECM is the introduction and the respective certification of a maintenance management system according to the regulation 445/2011/EU about a system for the certification of the position that has been assigned the maintenance of freight wagons.

Essentially this maintenance management system consists of a management function, a maintenance development function, a fleet maintenance management function and the maintenance provision function.