Hi guys. I'm in the process of making some adjustments to our QMS and one of the areas, due to past external audits and my first internal, is supplier quality. We're a small sized machine shop (30ish) employees. So our providers are typically raw material, hardware, and any special processes (mostly plating, heat treat, paint, and some weld specs we aren't certified to). We do have an approved supplier list but due to some QM turnover, it hasn't been maintained. What I'm here to ask about is if what I have in mind in terms of selection and evaluation criteria, and reevaluations would work to satisfy the standard. Currently there is no stated criteria listed in our QMS for how we select or evaluation vendors. It's stated that external provider perfomance is monitored (which is true in conformity and on time delivery) and reported on during management reviews. What I'd like to do is write up a Supplier Quality procedure, and state the criteria as something along the lines of
Vendors will be approved if they hold a current AS9100 or NADCAP certification. Vendors not currently certified may be approved by the President, and monitored on product or service conformity and OTD.
Luckily this is already the case with most of our product and service providers, I'm in the tedious process of storing a copy of their certifications in our software as a record, and making sure the expiration dates are correct on our approved vendor list. My re-evaluation would be to check our approved vendor list annually and reach out to any vendors who's certification has expired. Between that and an annual review of external providers conformity and OTD, is this enough level of control in your view? I'm trying to keep it lean, as most of our providers have been in business with us for quite some time, and do not contribute very often to nonconformities, but I want to do what is required.
The only other aspect of the standard I have to figure something out on is what to do is what actions to take when external providers do not meet requirements. Luckily we haven't had much trouble but there's no criteria set for what we do. I'm interested to see other peoples opinions on this. I'm thinking something as simple as "2 or supplier corrective action requests send in a 12 month period will cause vendor to be placed on a conditional standing, or provoke an on site visit, I'm not real sure. Any thoughts?
Vendors will be approved if they hold a current AS9100 or NADCAP certification. Vendors not currently certified may be approved by the President, and monitored on product or service conformity and OTD.
Luckily this is already the case with most of our product and service providers, I'm in the tedious process of storing a copy of their certifications in our software as a record, and making sure the expiration dates are correct on our approved vendor list. My re-evaluation would be to check our approved vendor list annually and reach out to any vendors who's certification has expired. Between that and an annual review of external providers conformity and OTD, is this enough level of control in your view? I'm trying to keep it lean, as most of our providers have been in business with us for quite some time, and do not contribute very often to nonconformities, but I want to do what is required.
The only other aspect of the standard I have to figure something out on is what to do is what actions to take when external providers do not meet requirements. Luckily we haven't had much trouble but there's no criteria set for what we do. I'm interested to see other peoples opinions on this. I'm thinking something as simple as "2 or supplier corrective action requests send in a 12 month period will cause vendor to be placed on a conditional standing, or provoke an on site visit, I'm not real sure. Any thoughts?
