Recently, I was having a discussion in this subject with one of our management staff.
I was always given the impression that the Third party auditors (Registration body) are not allowed to provide recommendations for correcting deficiencies, since this may be considered as a potential bias.
I wanted to clarify this and reviewed “The Quality Audit handbook” by J.P.Russell. In Page 111, he says that if requested by the client, Auditors may provide recommendations. He suggests placing Recommendations in an appendix separately. Also adds, In most cases, that auditee is not obligated to implement auditor’s recommendation.
This is interesting with current Registrar-Organizations relationships that exist in many cases. Registrars project themselves in advertisements as a “Value added service provider”. Some organizations also expect the 3rd party auditor to provide directions on complex issues with respect requirement implementation. This is a catch 22 situation. If auditor is not providing recommendations, the organizations may not prefer the registrar. If they did, they may become biased towards auditing the Corrective action since they recommended that in the first place!
1. Having said that, would you prefer the registration auditor to provide recommendations?
2. Have you had experiences where you had implemented a different approach from what the registration auditor recommended and convinced the auditor that you were right?
Govind.
I was always given the impression that the Third party auditors (Registration body) are not allowed to provide recommendations for correcting deficiencies, since this may be considered as a potential bias.
I wanted to clarify this and reviewed “The Quality Audit handbook” by J.P.Russell. In Page 111, he says that if requested by the client, Auditors may provide recommendations. He suggests placing Recommendations in an appendix separately. Also adds, In most cases, that auditee is not obligated to implement auditor’s recommendation.
This is interesting with current Registrar-Organizations relationships that exist in many cases. Registrars project themselves in advertisements as a “Value added service provider”. Some organizations also expect the 3rd party auditor to provide directions on complex issues with respect requirement implementation. This is a catch 22 situation. If auditor is not providing recommendations, the organizations may not prefer the registrar. If they did, they may become biased towards auditing the Corrective action since they recommended that in the first place!
1. Having said that, would you prefer the registration auditor to provide recommendations?
2. Have you had experiences where you had implemented a different approach from what the registration auditor recommended and convinced the auditor that you were right?
Govind.
