Must we do Receiving Inspection for everything?

[Big Jim]

"Silly"? These were electronic components from reputable suppliers, through their distributors. Are you really suggesting i.d, count and packaging damage, "inspection"?

Most emphatically, YES!

 

[whatnxt]

What does your Purchasing Procedure say? Does it state different criteria for purchased parts vs supplied parts? If not, then either the customer must compy or the procedure needs to be updated to include what you need to do for customer supplied parts.

As a CM, we also receive parts from the customer. On the item card in ERP, we list this as a "customer supplied part" and they take responsibility for the initial product quality. We inspect for shipping damage and count. State on the RI record the items that are missing, like C of C, correct packaging and the like. We do discuss this with the customer and understand what inspection they perform on the part before they deliver it to us. Everything is clearly stated in the purchasing procedure, purchasing agreement, and understood by both parties. If traceability is needed, we assign an in-house number that can be traced back to the PO, which states that no C of C was delivered and traceability to the original manufacturer is the responsibility of the supplier. For supplier quality, the customer gets the same report card as the rest of our suppliers. Bad product, poor OTD, it all gets reported.

 

[DRAMMAN]

My experience in the electronic CM world (EXTENSIVE) is that what WHATNXT describes is the most common practice regarding customer supplied material such as components of PCB's.

 

[AshleyE]

I am aware this is an ISO9001 question, but is this an appropriate area to take a cue from AS9100C?

7.4.3 Verification of Purchased Product


[Additional Requirement from AS9100C]
"Where the organization delegates verification activities to the supplier (in this case, the customer), the requirements for delegation shall be defined and a register of delegations maintained."

 

[DRAMMAN]

I would consider the AS9100 to be more specific about documenting the portions of inspection and verification that will be delegated to the customer. I would not conside it fundamentally different, just more sepcific.

 

[iamtroll]

Incoming inspection is like any other inspection, it is all about risk versus cost. Are your customers suppliers of pc boards so good that you would put them on a dock to stock program (if you have one) or do you find that your incoming inspection on your customer supplied product is revealing situations where the product is not acceptable and continually needs to be addressed with your customer before you can use their product or somewhere in between those two? You need to decide where your risk lies for each customer's supplier, some will be better than others and you probably already know which suppliers are best since you may be using the same ones in your processes. So treat them just like you would if they were you own suppliers. It doesn't pay in customer relations to tell you customer after you have populated the boards that their supplier gave you substandard product and you went ahead and used it, neither does it pay to perform needless incoming inspection. These are business decisions that can only be made if you gather the data on the incoming products and then set up your systems to describe what you are going to do about it and then do it. Quality systems shouldn't limit you to make well informed business decisions, they should support how you intend to run your business.