Introduction
1. MOD has a policy of Appropriate Certification; this means that where contracts are placed for products / services that are not simple, commercial-off-the-shelf or of low-value, and conformance to requirements cannot readily be checked after receipt, the IPTL must make sure that such contracts are only placed with contractors holding an appropriate quality system certification.
2. The International Standards organisation (ISO) 9000 family of standards do not address all of the MOD's contracting requirements and are therefore unsuitable for use in contracts. However, the Allied Quality Assurance Publications (AQAPs) of the 2000 series meet the MOD's contracting needs, embodying the requirements of the ISO 9001:2000 standard and importantly include additional clauses to meet MOD specific needs such as access to contractors' premises.
3. This use of the AQAPs is consistent with the order of preference, or hierarchy for standards selection in that the additional clauses constitute overarching MOD requirements. For more information see Standards Selection on the DStan website.