AS 9100 Registrar Audits: Failure Modes

[DannyK]

One of my clients ran into an interesting situation during their initial AS9120 assessment. The scope of their system is for aerospace products only for both AS9120 and ISO 9001 yet the auditor issued a finding snce they did not evaluate their suppliers for commercial product.

Any opinions?

What should the client do if the auditor does not leave the AS9101 or AS9121 checklist at the conclusion of the audit?

Is there anyone to report this situation?

 

[howste]

One of my clients ran into an interesting situation during their initial AS9120 assessment. The scope of their system is for aerospace products only for both AS9120 and ISO 9001 yet the auditor issued a finding snce they did not evaluate their suppliers for commercial product.

Any opinions?

They should appeal it. If it's outside the scope of the certification, the nonconformity is invalid.

What should the client do if the auditor does not leave the AS9101 or AS9121 checklist at the conclusion of the audit?

Is there anyone to report this situation?

AS9104 states in clause 8.4:

The CRB shall leave copies of all information pertaining to the audit results (including checklists, findings, supporting documents, or other correspondence) with the organization for the purpose of the organization sharing this information with their customers.

It looks like you're aware that they should be leaving a copy. If they don't leave it, you can certainly complain to the certification body. If you want more visibility, you can do it in the OASIS database. On the OASIS page, there's a "Feedback For Certification/Registration Bodies (CRB)" link on the left side.

 

[DannyK]

Howste, Thanks for your feedback.

I sent the same information to the AS9100 Product Manager for the registrar and he said that the nonconformity is valid because the ISO 9001 covers the "non aerospace suppliers". He seemed to ignore the fact that both the AS9120 and ISO 9001 scope are identical and specify "aerospace" product.

I have sent the AS9100 Product Manager and he has not responded yet.

Any suggestions regarding the course of action?

 

[howste]

The first course of action should always be to try to work it out with the CB. If they don't respond satisfactorily, take it to the accreditation body. Here's what the ANAB website says about it:

If you have a complaint about a CB:
If you represent a certified company with a complaint about your CB, make your complaint in writing directly to the CB. If you don't receive a reasonable response, complain in writing to the accreditation body whose mark appears on the certificate issued by the CB and include a copy of any correspondence with your CB about your complaint. The same process applies for anyone - including a competing CB - with a complaint about a CB.

 

[Sidney Vianna]

And don't forget the (broken link removed)....

 

[Sidney Vianna]

A recent statistical analysis of incidence of NC's per clause of the AS9100B standard is attached.

 

[Jim Wynne]

A recent statistical analysis of incidence of NC's per clause of the AS9100B standard is attached.

What is "OPMT"? It looks like the overall average of NCs is less than one--is this possible?

 

[Sidney Vianna]

What is "OPMT"?

Other Party Management Team.

It looks like the overall average of NCs is less than one--is this possible?

I can see that the unit of measure is unclear. The chart depicts the average number of NC's per clause PER AUDIT. So, for example for clause 7.4 of AS9100, 0.5 means that, in average, half of the audits done to AS9100 contain a NC against that clause.