posted 13 August 2001 01:26 PM               

How do you want to go about this?

Cheers!!

posted 15 August 2001 12:09 PM               

well all that was food for thought....

Benchmarking done correctly needs a base, similar to what Al started in his data base thread so you can compare apples to apples and to oranges with fruit salad as the goal.

So basically the plan I typically use is to find the players, and see/know the variables, then define what to benchmark and how to approach it(data to collect)....and then start the comparisons/gather the data. Some one reviews what is submitted and reports to the group.

posted 15 August 2001 12:19 PM               

Its basically a list of where it goes as it makes its way back, who was responsible for it and what system/lots they assigned and a place for inspection by you or your designated authority (source insp, or incoming at your site or whatever you already do...)

posted 15 August 2001 01:19 PM               

All material was received using a "receiving ticket/inspection report". These were sequentially numbered. After material was accepted, this became the lot number. If the material was "raw material", i.e. bar stock to be used in the machine shop, the lot number became the job number. If we had multiple uses for a particular "lot", we could break it down further by adding "-" numbers to the base lot number, i.e. Material from lot #1234 would be used for job #'s 1234-1, 1234-2 and so on. After all manufacturing of the componenet was complete, or if the part was purchased complete, the parts would be sent to the stock room until pulled for an assembly job. The router for the assembly listed a bill of materials and had a space to record the lot numbers for each item pulled for the assembly job.
This gave us full traceability back to the original mill or component supplier. And, unfortunately, it paid for itself when we had to do a product recall. We new exactly which customers had the defective product.

Good Luck!

posted 16 August 2001 09:45 AM               

Gotta agree with Barb - as long as your lot number does what you want it to do - maintain tracability - then how long is too long is really up to you. Sometimes shorter is not necessarily better, especially if you loose vital information.

You said that your system is great. Personally, I feel that if it's not broken... why try to fix it?

Cheers!

posted 17 August 2001 02:45 PM               

We use a Julian numbering system for those Items (not that we have that many)

229-137 is todays shipment number - that traces back to our origional Work order release transpose it into 229-1371 for year 2001 and we're in. That shipment left here 8/17/01 and MRP tells us what WO# it was shipped from - clear back to raw material certs.

posted 17 August 2001 08:32 PM               

In my 20+ years of quality practice we have always used some type of traceability process. The bottom line for me is that when our products were shipped to the customer they removed our tags.

When they called and said they had a problem with a batch of material my first question would be: Can I have the label/traceability info. Invariably they did not have the info but still wanted an answer to their "PRR".

At the time the President I worked for said not to answer any "PRR's" until they returned the traceability info.

I happily complied until the President was called to headquarters to answer to the SQA, needless to say he was unavailable at the time and sent me.

I was politely (hahahahaha) told by the SQA that they were the customer and had bad parts and couldn't give a sh*t about our traceability system. It was not a specific requirement for us from this customer.

Ultimately my President called the SQA's supervisor and had a discussion. We didn't ship that part for two months until the customer finally called and said they had gone through all their back stock that had accumulated over the years and they were perfectly servicable parts.

We resumed production to replentish their JIT process. Boy, sales were good on that part for a good few months and we seemed to have no "quality" problems after that.

Just a rambling story about how the process can work. It doesn't work for everyone, but a supplier can still stand firm if they have their ducks in a row.

Stepping down from soapbox now.

posted 25 August 2001 01:24 PM               

I feel I have to apologize again, I truly did not mean my comment to be a downer on the benchmarking traceability post. I think it is important but one of the overlooked aspects of developing, maintaining, and improving a quality/management system. Highlite on management!!!!