Is it mandatory to monitor customer satisfaction for a non-regular product?

[samsung]

Have you sold other things to the same customers? I ask this because you shouldn't get an NC because some customers didn't give you feedback on one item when they may have given you feedback on others. We have thousands of part numbers and can't possible get feedback on every one, so we sort by customer. And even then a registrar cannot expect feedback from every single customer.

No, this is the only item sold to these customers. I am still not able to understand what our consultant (he is also a full time registrar with DNV) indicates, i.e.; 'Certification scope' which reads as "Manufacturing of Ordinary Portland Cement & Portland Pozzolana Cement" and sites 2 locations, one is our works & second one is our Marketing H.O. address where it states "Marketing of Ordinary Portland Cement & Portland Pozzolana Cement" and nothing else. The semi-finished product under discussion is called "Clinker" which can be used to produce variety of cement.

Should we do or we should not do, CB can raise an NC or cannot, still not clear. Need more info.

Regards,

 

[harry]

No, this is the only item sold to these customers. I am still not able to understand what our consultant (he is also a full time registrar with DNV) indicates, i.e.; 'Certification scope' which reads as "Manufacturing of Ordinary Portland Cement & Portland Pozzolana Cement" and sites 2 locations, one is our works & second one is our Marketing H.O. address where it states "Marketing of Ordinary Portland Cement & Portland Pozzolana Cement" and nothing else. The semi-finished product under discussion is called "Clinker" which can be used to produce variety of cement.

Should we do or we should not do, CB can raise an NC or cannot, still not clear. Need more info.

Regards,

The Cement industry in most markets are oligopolies. Few players practically control the market (because of the need for heavy investments upfront). Every other month, some plants will be shut down for maintenance or due to breakdowns, so they get their supply of clinker from other sites or others. It is actually a you scratch my back, I scratch yours arrangement and not a sales per se. On top of that, quality is based on approved standards and everybody practically knows what the other is doing and therefore not an issue.

Is there a need to survey such a 'customer'? I think the most important criteria is auditors for this business need to have knowledge of the business. If the auditor from your CB is experienced, I don't think you need to worry.

By the way, are your internal auditors knowledgeable in your business? I always believe that the company (your organization) is the expert in your own business and should carry out your own audit for maximum benefits.

 

[Diana Marie Howard]

Do you have evidence that you monitor customer satisfaction for other customers? The way I see this you should be able to provide evidence that you have a method for obtaining and using the information you get pertaining to the customers perceptions of your ability to met their requirements? If you have a method and are using the information for other customers you should not be given a NC. I would consider this a one off situation. One of the most solid ways of resolving this problem is to provide all customers with an annual survey asking for their input. It can be done by email and designed to give you a statistical measure of the customers satisfaction. If you have this type of struggle with your audit team often, you may wish to consider another source.

 

[Polly Pure Bread]

In every rule there is an exception. There will be times that it is not wise to measure all costumer satisfaction. The reason is simple, waste. When it comes to monitoring large volumes of customer perception/satisfaction, IMHO, what truly matters is not what you monitor but which you monitor. Besides, not all customers provide feedbacks.

I agree with Diana Marie, the important thing is

....have a method for obtaining and using the information you get pertaining to the customers perceptions of your ability to met their requirements.

Otherwise, you will sink deeper into spending a lot of resources just to get all costumers perception. Method can be sampling. Poor monitoring follows wrong formula/method.

 

[samsung]

The Cement industry in most markets are oligopolies. Few players practically control the market (because of the need for heavy investments upfront). Every other month, some plants will be shut down for maintenance or due to breakdowns, so they get their supply of clinker from other sites or others. It is actually a you scratch my back, I scratch yours arrangement and not a sales per se. On top of that, quality is based on approved standards and everybody practically knows what the other is doing and therefore not an issue.

Is there a need to survey such a 'customer'? I think the most important criteria is auditors for this business need to have knowledge of the business. If the auditor from your CB is experienced, I don't think you need to worry.

By the way, are your internal auditors knowledgeable in your business? I always believe that the company (your organization) is the expert in your own business and should carry out your own audit for maximum benefits.

Now it seems that I have got some reasonable explanation to my query. Thank you very much. Thanks to Diana Marie & dQApprentice as well for their thoughtful add on.

You rightly judged the issue. It is "you scratch my back, I scratch yours arrangement and not a sales per se." I know that they know every bit of facts & will not put up any issue.

Normally our Internal Auditors do the job but this time the management, just for a change, outsourced the activity (for an offsite single department only) and very probably the guys didn't have in-depth knowledge of our business. Now, I got hold of the issue and conclude that we don't need to deploy additional resources for surveying these special type of customers.

And yes, I do agree with what Diana Marie has advised, "....have a method for obtaining and using the information you get pertaining to the customers perceptions of your ability to met their requirements.". We have a system in place for monitoring & measuring customer satisfaction at defined intervals and whatever feedback and information they provide is returned to them but with some value added to it.

Thanks once again and regards,

 

[somashekar]

Hellow!

In a recent Internal Audit of one of our offsite marketing offices, the auditors (Internal but outsourced locally) raised an NC for lack of evidence on monitoring customer satisfaction & feedback for a non-regular product?

By non-regular, I mean an intermediate & non-finished product (one stage prior to the final one) which is not a regular product and occasionally sold depending on market demand and realization potential. This product is further processed by the customers to produce what we know as Final or Saleable product.

Our consultant says customer satisfaction is not required to be monitored since this 'product' doesn't fall under the scope of certification and is not subjected to regular sale.

My question - Is it mandatory to monitor customer satisfaction anyway for an intermediate or non-finished product whose sale is not defined under the scope of ISO 9001 certification?

Can a CB auditor legitimately ask for evidence of monitoring CS in lieu of sale of such products?

Many many thanks well in advance,

Regards,

It is always good to remember that CUSTOMER SATISFACTION is about customer saying how much he is satisfied with you (to a measureable level) and not you telling a customer is satisfed to yourself or to an external agency. In this context you can device the methodology suitably and you can also scale it depending upon your customer business share. This activity gives an input for your improvement plans and as long as you can show that this data is measured, analysed and improvement plans framed its fine I guess.

 

[samsung]

It is always good to remember that CUSTOMER SATISFACTION is about customer saying how much he is satisfied with you (to a measurable level) and not you telling a customer is satisfied to yourself or to an external agency. In this context you can device the methodology suitably and you can also scale it depending upon your customer business share. This activity gives an input for your improvement plans and as long as you can show that this data is measured, analysed and improvement plans framed its fine I guess.

I appreciate your thoughtfulness and append that despite the type of products/ customers and their share in the overall business volume, one can (and should) still look at customer feedback in a proactive, attentive & thoughtful way atleast under the presumption that if, per chance, there are negative pool of feedback w.r.t. quality or quantity or delivery or pricing, invoicing or whatever, it certainly indicates that there are problems, not only in the product but also in the downstream processes through which the product once passed through and those processes, sometimes (if not always) failed to detect the problems during the life of its manufacturing and/or processing and allowed the product to reach customer's hands. And under the given circumstances, in my opinion, such symptoms may add to undermine "an organization's ability to consistently supply products that meet customer requirements" and win their confidence to favour it's (org's) own sustainable development.

In short, it always makes sound sense to proactively obtain & use such information provided it adds value to business & at the same time does not take away much of your valuable resources.