During TS Pre-Audit we generated a finding for a lack of supplier re-evaluation.

7.4.1 Purchasing Process ..."Criteria for selection, evaluation, and re-evaluation shall be established."

We state the criteria for selection and evaluation in our manual. That is, a list of the desirable qualities that we look for in a supplier and how well and how many the supplier does. We state that suppliers are re-evaluated annually at the first Management Review.

Here's why we got dinged: we don't state the frequency of re-evaluation or what criteria suppliers are re-evaluated against. Now obviously, the frequency is annually, it's a review of the approved supplier list, and their performance in Management Review.

I read the criteria for re-evaluation to mean: what would trigger a re-evaluation. If my supplier remains registered to ISO9001, sends me no defects, delivers 100% on time, why would I go back and re-evaluate them against the original criteria? If they don't, intuitively, I would re-evaluate them against the original criteria.

The auditor reads: define a frequency (at least annually), a list of things to re-evaluate, and go back and do the whole thing over for every supplier, every year. That's a waste in my book.

What gives? Where do they get this stuff?

We use a defined Vendor Rating System as our continuing re-evaluation. We base our evaluation on quarterly evaluation of the supplier's on-time delivery, quality issues, continuing QMS certification, communication, cooperation and price. Each category is scored numerically, some with heavier weighting than others, and a total score is determined with a "scorecard" being sent to the supplier. Those falling below a specified "score" are given to the purchasing manager for re-evaluation. Sometimes an 8-D is requested to correct problems and other times an audit or visit is arranged. This system has so far satisfied our auditors.

Dave

DS,
That's basically what we are doing. Constantly monitor your suppliers for OTD, defects, whatever is important. As long as they maintain their metric you don't need to re-evaluate. Therefore, the criteria for re-evaluation is not a list of things to re-evaluate but rather a metric that triggers ANOTHER (re) evaluation.
-Icy.