How many companies are giving up ISO9000 registration?

Could it be???

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Subject: Q: How many companies are giving up registration? /Naish
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 1999 13:49:54 -0600
From: ISO Standards Discussion

From: PNaish
Subject: Q: How many companies are giving up registration? /Naish

I was recently handed an article in EBN (Electronic Buyers News) which showed a poll of electronic distributors and their opinions on ISO. Of the companies polled only 60% have ever been registered. Out of that some 40% or so have since given up their certificates. Of the remainder currently registered about 25% were thinking of giving it up especially when the 2000 version comes out.

Several people have brought up the subject before that they did not understand why people would give up registration. If you are still interested in knowing why, you may want to get a copy of that article.

My question however is this: How many people on this list have been registered in their present company or a former company and have given up registration? Can you tell us why your company did so? Since the article addresses only electronic distributors I would like to hear from anyone in another industry that might see a trend in that industry as well or just an isolated case.

Phyllis

From: PNaish
Subject: FYI: Distribution Poll Article /Naish

I have finally gotten the reference for the source relating to Distributors. I misquoted the source since I had been told the information and had not checked it out personally. I have since gotten the source info.

I can not send a copy as many of you have asked since the article is in a copyrighted document. I am sure you can get it from the author or from a large public library if you have one.

The source is ELECTRONIC DISTRIBUTION TODAY. It is in the July 1999 issue on pages 15 and 17. It is quite an interesting article but having some inside information should not necessarily be taken at face value. I am not at liberty to say more but their are more reasons than those listed behind some of it.

Phyllis

[Marc]

From: PNaish 8-SEP-1999 21:05:31.27
To: JENNEJOHNN
Subj: RE: How many cos are giving up registration? /../Hodges/Tribaldos/naish

>>>>>I participated recently in a survey of registered companies in Panama, carried out by Industrial Engineering students. It was found that, at the time, there were 29 companies registered (certified under ISO 9002). Of these, only 2 implemented the system under internal motivation or corporate directive. The other 27 all did it under pressure from customers or regulatory bodies. This means that only 2 of those 29 can afford to give up their registration and not be certain to lose the business to the registered competition. I wonder what the initial motivation was on those 40% who gave up registration and the 25% that are thinking about giving it up. Can someone provide more light into this, please.<<<

There are as many reasons as there are companies but here are some of the
reasons I have been given directly or indirectly:

ISO dropped before or after 1994 change but no relation to 2000 change:

1)Costs too much and get nothing back.

2)Our customer don't ask for it so we don't need it.

3)We got the customer we wanted by having it but no one has asked since so we are going to drop it until someone asks again! (This one is a good one because I wonder how many of you out there that qualified your supplier originally because they had the certificate even know if they are currently registered or not?)

4) We don't want to have to do all that record keeping.

5) There's no way I am going to let anyone tell me how to run my company and I am tired of auditors who are.

6) We can't afford the costs to keep it up.

ISO will be dropped for the 2000 changes:
1) We do not see any value in all the extra book keeping the changes are asking for. They don't buy us anything since we are already doing them just not documenting them and don't want to have to do all this extra work. (Most of this seems to revolve around the work to obtain customer satisfaction information and prove it to a registrar as well as thoroughly documenting their improvement projects to meet what they expect an auditor will want or and auditor has indicted in an observation already).

2) I do not need the ISO people and OSHA auditing my environment for how I treat my employees. It seems like I have to please everyone that comes along.

3) I am going to have to change all my documents since they renumbered the standard and I don't want to have to go through that. (And yes they will have to change their document since they specifically call out the section of the standard that relates to the documents. This will no longer be correct so it will have to be changed as was so duly noted by an auditor).

4) I don't want to have to go through and have my people retrained on the standards all over again just so they know where things are. Why didn't they leave it alone.

5) We've already talked to some of our big customer and they say it doesn't matter any more since we have been doing such a good job. So we are going to cut our costs and drop it.

Some companies as you said will have no choice because some of their
customers will require it. And others will not keep the cert if they are not
required to by the customer.

Since so many companies who have been required in the past by their customers
have never been asked since nor has anyone recently asked them in order to
qualify them why should they stay registered?

Everyone seems to want to know why they would not want to be registered, the limited survey above seems to indicate that less than 10% do it unles required by the customer. SO I pose this question: What does being registered do for them that they can't do on their own if they have a good quality system which fosters continuous improvement and skillful internal auditors who help ensure the system stays functional? Why are we paying these registrars to come in?

Phyllis