Control and Revision of a Corporate QA Manual

[chris_gray1980]

Hey all

This may be a really basic question but im working with an old Corporate QA Manual..

in our manual is states that we will mark up any revisions in RED and with a revision triangle! i am currently undergoing a major review and there are going to be a lot of changes as well as removing a lot of old content...

how is the best way to show what has changed, do i have to show whats changed (i do have a issue history chart on one of my pages which i will fill in but im not going to sit and put every little thing i have changed, it will make the manual look a mess..

The Manual its self is at the moment a 30 page manual (its a corporate manual and covers around 10 companies so the org charts are the majority of the manual) the Manual is issued as a whole not sure if this is a good thing or not? should i have every page as a issue so i can just rev/issue up the page? rather than re-issue the full manual (on minor changes).

The manual actually states how it will be controlled in it, is this necessary? i have seen quite a few samples on here and none seem to include half of what i have.

I hope this makes sense to someone

Thanks

Chris

 

[ScottK]

Re: Control of a QA Manual

Hi Chris.

there are a hundred ways to document revisions to manuals and procedures.
The method stated in your manual was probably the original author's preferred way of doing it.
Personally I don't like leaving the old rev in the original documents with red lines or margin notes. I find it clutters the document making it harder to read.
Rather, I note changes in a revision box at the end and archive one copy of the obsolete document for future reference if needed.
You can also keep revision notes on a separate form... a document change record.
There is no BEST WAY that will fit everyone... Whatever works for your organization is the best way.

The bottom line, though, is that you have to comply with your document control process. The good news is, you can change that too if you have a better way.
So while you're updating your manual, update it's control requirements.

As long as senior management is behind it....They have to support your changes.

 

[chris_gray1980]

Re: Control of a QA Manual

That's a long the lines I were thinking.. I hate having old and new in the same thing... I do have a issue history page in the manual so will just use that and archive the old one.. How much detail do I need? Do I need to document every change in the history page because it may fill a page..

Thanks Scott I can crack on with that tomorrow.. All procedures are going through a major review as we speak so I wil change it to the above.. I want it as simple as possible

Thanks

Chris

 

[ScottK]

Re: Control of a QA Manual

That's a long the lines I were thinking.. I hate having old and new in the same thing... I do have a issue history page in the manual so will just use that and archive the old one.. How much detail do I need? Do I need to document every change in the history page because it may fill a page..

Thanks Scott I can crack on with that tomorrow.. All procedures are going through a major review as we speak so I wil change it to the above.. I want it as simple as possible

Thanks

Chris

You're welcome.

I generally summararize in the rev history section. Anyone who needs to see the exact changes in, say, an audit will be shown the the archive folder.

good luck with the project!

 

[keres]

how is the best way to show what has changed

I use bold and italic font to show what was changed.