I received an interesting envelope from the AIAG pertaining to ISO/IEC Guide 25 accreditation. It appears that your company can submit an application to become a calibration auditor and audit your outside calibration labs to this standard to meet the deadline of Jan. 1, 2001. It cost around $1200 to take the exam. I must admit-I'm a bit confused as it appeared to be so important to have accredited calibration labs-important enough to make it a shall in the QS standard. If I pass the auditor exam, and I can go audit my own calibraiton labs, couldn't I pass whomever I felt like? Supposing there are companies out there who really don't give a darn whether their cal labs are accredited or not, and they are the cheapest in town and they audit them themselves just so they can pass them? How important does it seem now? Not only that, if you pass them, they are officially recognized as an accredited lab and the guy down the road doesn't even have to audit them. Anyone know what the scoop is here?

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I believe the B3 got themselves wrapped around the pole with this guide 25 stuff! I think you're right, Dawn. It seems to me that a supplier can now 2nd party audit an outside lab and all this due to the lack of accredited labs. However, someone pockets the $1200 in the meantime!!

I also got a surprise. Received a draft of a material specification from one of the Big 3.5. This is the wording of the General Requirements:

"Testing is to be performed by a laboratory approved to GM GP-10 or by a laboratory accredited or certified to perform audits by an agency recognized by GM to ISO/IEC25 or ISO 17025. Registration to QS9000 is not a substitute for lab accreditation".

Any comments? I'm totally confused!

This section was not in the original specification, just the updated draft dated March 2000.