Ford, QOS and QS9000

[Roger Eastin]

No question, just a point. It seems that Ford never really bought into the merits of QS9000 as a stand-alone system. First, they never required 3rd party registration to QS9K, and never stopped customer visits. Now they're starting to talk more about QOS than QS or TS. I don't know much about QOS, but I'd better learn. We are a 2nd tier supplier, but Ford is coming to visit us next week to tour our facility. I'll bet that we will start hearing about the Ford QOS program soon. It does make me wonder if Ford will drop off the TS16949 bandwagon sooner or later.

 

[Marc]

I agree that Ford was never really on board for QS. I have no idea what part TS 16949 will play for them, but I'm betting that they will in some way reference it. Maybe not.

 

[Unregistered]

Actually QS9k is required for Q1 if you look into Q1 2002 book you will find that.

 

[Marc]

They'll keep TS as the 'base' but QOS --> Q1 is their 'baby'. I'm involved in a Q1 project now, as it turns out...

> Actually QS9k is required for Q1 if you look into Q1 2002
> book you will find that.

I have it and saw it - but (Is this deja vu? Did we discuss this in another recent thread or am I loosing it?) it is new. They didn't used to actually require QS registration - they required compliance so it was close anyway, I guess. But tier 1's all did the QS Registration dance anyway most probably of mixed business. And - with their latest announcement (according to Quality Magazine I think) Ford has dropped the QS requirement and replaced it with the TS requirement.