Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Aircraft Equipment Problem Less Severe; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy
General None Reported / Taken
Aircraft; Company Policy
Upon arriving to the aircraft a note was in the remarks section to call Maintenance. Upon calling I was told; and this was confirmed via the previous day logbook; that the inbound flight experienced a 'number two Integrated Drive Generator (IDG) Oil and Fail' caution message along with the oil temperature/pressure yellow light lighting up several times in flight. The previous crew had written it up; but not carried out the MEL; so it was an open write up. Maintenance wanted me to defer this write up with a MEL; since the previous crew did not wish to complete this action the prior day. I inquired as to why no Maintenance had come to fix it overnight; Maintenance responded that there was no sense in paying for contract Maintenance to come out when it is a crew reset action. Maintenance also said that contract Maintenance is not certified to run our aircraft engines. I reluctantly agreed to do the O item on the MEL.I feel in reflection; that I should not have conducted this MEL. I came to an aircraft not knowing the full story. There is no reason why local Maintenance could not have been called to fix this. There might have been further issues no one knew off. Cutting economical corners can lead to errors beyond just economics. What if for various reasons; including fatigue; the prior Captain had written down the wrong IDG and so I by just following his write up; might have disconnected the wrong IDG. I from this point on will be insistent that Maintenance be sent to the aircraft instead of me fixing an ambiguous and open problem that has not been looked at. This is in the interest of safety.
ERJ-170 Captain reported he was asked to depart with a maintenance item that was carried over from the previous night because of a contract Maintenance cost issue.