TS 16949 becoming automotive standard of choice

[Roger Eastin]

Marc - we may want to change the name of this forum to TS16949. Anyway, I was at a conference where a Daimlier/Chrysler Quality Manager was speaking. He indicated strongly that his company's position in the near future (Jan 2000?) regarding QS or TS, was that TS16949 would be the standard of choice. Although he said the B3 were frustrated by the quality of QS9K audits that 3rd party registrars were giving, that was not the sole reason for changing standards. He said that TS16949 should be easier for the B3 to manage and that the B3 (& other European automakers?) would be much more stringent in mandating certain auditor requirements. He said that the B3 were still seeing too many bad products coming from suppliers and that the auditors should be picking these "systemic" problems up during their audits. He also said that as part of the accreditation body witness audits, that their may be a B3 auditor observing the 3rd party audit as well as the accreditation body auditor. The B3 auditor would be looking for questions being asked about sufficiency of continuous improvement efforts, scrap reduction, preventive action efforts, etc. He was obviously bothered by the fact that the QS9K 3rd party audits were not producing the results that Daimlier/Chrysler expected to see. Sooooo....move over QS9K, the TS freight train is coming!!!

 

[Marc]

The first mistake is to believe QS9000 is 'the' answer to bad product.

Without going into details, I have seen ISO audits go down hill since QS came on the scene. Things were more 'strict' a few years back. I believe what we are seeing is, in part, driven by the explosion in registrations and the QS 'problem child'. I have seen UL auditors go in one plant and rip the cal labs a new a___ole over bias and related calculations while another client the UL auditor completely overlooks serious laboratory problems.

I don't doubt the b3 would like to drop QS. It has become an albatross and (for example me...) some prople use it's very existence (and things like the IASG interpretations) to word-whip the b3. Getting it into ISO's hands is smart. If you remember, the b3 claimed many times over that ISO9001 was dead and QS9000 was the successor-to-be. QS9 never made it as a winner in any way, shape or form. And not one other auto manufacturer (that I am aware of other than in Australia) in the world paid any significant attention to QS9.

Yup - TS16949 appears to be the future. It may be that QS9000 may make 8 years (came out in 1994) but that looks to be about it. There's too much invested in it for it to drop like a rock. It will fade away.

 

[Mike525]

Marc, you hit it right on the head. The disparity in application within the same Registrar is alarming. I, for one, am sick and tired of hearing auditors state "their understanding" of the standard - which leaves little to discuss. Our registrar does several plants within the corporation and I am amazed to hear the difference in application of QS-9000 between the different plants. When I first heard of TS16949 (then TR) sometime last year? I did believe that it was going to be the future, and I'me glad to see it happening. The B3 and AIAG are at fault for putting a stanglehold on the industry, and allowing things to go south they way they have with QS-9000. Could've been, should've been, but it all boils down to what it really is, and right now its a mess, in my opinion.

 

[Marc]

Aftr a couple of audits, one multinational client required their registrar to provide the same lead assessor at every audit at every plant (world wide). The disparities between auditors was so glaring it was impossible to get consistent interpretations.

 

[Roger Eastin]

This Daimlier/Chrysler guy seemed at first to blame the standard for the woes and travails of the B3, but it soon became clearer to us in the room that he (& his company) was frustrated by the 'apparent' lack of skill the auditors had in interpreting the standard. ("Interpreting the standard" is a phrase that has a clearer definition to the B3 than to anyone else.) To me, the requirements for auditors for TS16949 will be stiffer than for any standard so far, if the B3 has their way. I suppose that this may be the subject of a joint release by the B3 of customer-specific requirements. (Curiously, GM doesn't seem to be on the TS16949 bandwagon, yet.) That's an inference I've made from comments made by the Chrysler guy. By the way, I think, also, that putting the auto standard into ISO hands is a good idea.

 

[Marc]

We'll find out soon enough, I guess. Looked at TS16949.com:

-------snippo--------

Whois user[@<whois.server>]: ts16949.com

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Registrant:
Steel Related Industries (TS33-DOM)
2000 Corporate Drive, Suite 580
Wexford, PA 15090
US

Domain Name: TS16949.COM

Administrative Contact:
Lake, Peter (PL1038) [email protected]
412.934.9000 (FAX) 412.935.6825
Technical Contact, Zone Contact:
HostAmerica InterNIC Registrar (HIR-ORG) [email protected]
(800) 416-8078
Fax- (404) 237-3060
Billing Contact:
Clark, Jason (JC24444) [email protected]
724-789-7200

Record last updated on 07-Apr-99.
Record created on 07-Apr-99.
Database last updated on 28-Sep-99 06:57:25 EDT.

Domain servers in listed order:

NS.HOSTAMERICA.COM 209.235.112.20
NS2.HOSTAMERICA.COM 209.235.112.3

• Whois complete 9/29/99 7:31:42 PM •

-------snippo--------

But - I did snag 16949.com. Within a couple of days both 16949.com and qs9000.com will automagically transport you to this site.

I also checked out ISO16949.com. It's (somewhat recently) been taken by:

--------snippo-------

Registrant:
Smithers Scientific Services (ISO72-DOM)
425 West Market Street
Akron, OH 44309-2099
US

Domain Name: ISO16949.COM

Administrative Contact:
Domeck, Douglas C (DCD15) [email protected]
330-762-7441 (FAX) 330-762-7447
Technical Contact, Zone Contact:
GWIS NOC (GN3-ORG) [email protected]
330-656-5511
Fax- 330-656-5440
Billing Contact:
Domeck, Douglas C (DCD15) [email protected]
330-762-7441 (FAX) 330-762-7447

Record last updated on 26-Aug-99.
Record created on 26-Aug-99.
Database last updated on 28-Sep-99 06:57:25 EDT.

Domain servers in listed order:

DARCY.GWIS.COM 209.57.72.3
TAYLOR.GWIS.COM 209.57.74.25

• Whois complete 9/29/99 7:38:46 PM •

---------snippo-------

Obviously others are looking to cash in on the standard.

 

[Marc]

What was the conference you were at, Roger?

 

[Roger Eastin]

Marc - What was the "16949.com" message about? I didn't understand a lot of the text in that message. Were the companies listed those that are linked, in a business sense, to registering companies to TS16949? Anyway, the conference that I was at was a quality standards conference which had as one of its topics QS9K & TS16949. Hence, the involvement of the Chrysler guy...

 

[Marc]

The 16949.com thing is just that I just 'leased' the domain name. Above are the two companies/people who got TS16949.com and ISO16949.com

Who gave/sponsored the conference you were at?

 

[Roger Eastin]

Actually, it was a registrar training session and as part of that training, they had the Chrysler guy (I can't remember his whole name) address the new Sanctioned Interpretations coming out in Jan 00 and TS16949.