This good information and its helped me to understand the ISO way.
I have a question and i hope you can help me. When a customer comes in and that person ask show me your level 1, level 2 and level 3. What are they? I new to this and I'm trying to understand this terminology.

I have a question and i hope you can help me. When a customer comes in and that person ask show me your level 1, level 2 and level 3 documents. What are they? I new to this and I'm trying to understand this terminology.:thanx:

This good information and its helped me to understand the ISO way.
I have a question and i hope you can help me. When a customer comes in and that person ask show me your level 1, level 2 and level 3. What are they? I new to this and I'm trying to understand this terminology.Good question for a newbie. Welcome to the Cove!:bigwave:
My colleagues may elaborate, but most folks accept that a QMS (Quality Management System) has a minimum of three levels of documents ranging from high level overview of the system (Level 1) and becoming increasingly more detailed and specific as the documents address different portions of the system.

Some folks would probably accept this ranking:
Level 1 - Quality policy and Quality Manual
Level 2 - Departmental or overall process instructions (Procedures)
Level 3 - Work instructions for individual tasks (setting up a machine, drafting an engineering drawing, etc.)

I note you are in the metal tubing business in a western suburb of Chicago. Level one documents would probably be your Quality Manual and overall Quality Policy
Level two might be Procedures for accepting orders and assigning fulfillment to a group or department.
Level three might be work instructions for sawing or shearing tubing to length to suit a customer's requirements.

Hope this helps start you on the path to enlightenment.

Brandon:
Level 1 = Quality Policy manual
Level 2 - Procedures/Process documents
Level 3 = Work instructions

........................in very basic terms. There are other versions of this, but you have it in essence.

It's common to break down documentation into those terms, but the ISO has nothing to do with it.

Most frequently Level 1 or Tier 1 will be your policy and Quality manual

Level 2 or Tier 2 will be your highest level of procedures, SOP's or whatever you call them (it doesn't really matter as long as you know what they are and what they are for)

Level 3 or Tier 3 would be lower level instructional documents commonly called work instructions or whatever as well.

Level 4 or Tier 4 are records, databases, reports and that kind of stuff.

You don't have to use any of the above terms or levels, it's up to you.

You can also do what many organizatuions do and that's to combine the 2 & 3 levels into a single level.

Don't allow anyone to dictate what you call things or how to arrange them, in the end all you need to do is to be able to control your documents and records as required by the standard.

Just for giggles I'd like to see some brave soul call their documents "The words we do stuff by" and their records "The proof we did stuff according to the words we do stuff by":lol:

Also with your client or anyone else, they only need to look at the stuff that is relevant to them and according to whatever agreements you make.

Hi BBrandon,

I concur with Andy N and Randy, who has further provided a concise overview of this documentation.

I might only add that, one other Level or Tier which I have observed (typically between Randy's Tier 3 and 4) is the FORMS level of documents. Those are the blank pre-formatted sheets on which records are created, and which should be controlled documents. They are also part of your System.

Patricia

I merged the original question from another thread and my response into this thread. Sorry for any confusion it causes, but I think it will be less confusion than having two separate threads running on exactly the same topic.

I have a question and i hope you can help me. When a customer comes in and that person ask show me your level 1, level 2 and level 3 documents. What are they? I new to this and I'm trying to understand this terminology.:thanx:

As an afterthought, since you say you're new to this, I thought I would attach a fairly typical sample of an organization's Documentation Structure for your reference.

Hope this helps.
Patricia

P.S. Since so many companies now have Management Systems that integrate Quality, Environment, Materials Management (MMOG) and other Standards, as well as customer-specific requirements, it hardly seems appropriate to call them "Quality" Manuals anymore, and for them, the Quality Manual has evolved into the Business or Management Operating System Manual.