QA Inspection Gate - QA caught defect in the buy-off stage?

[chiuinggum - 2007]

In the shopfloor we have a QA gate to buy-off the final product before they are ship to customer. I would like to know what are the action shall be taken by Production if QA caught defect in the buy-off stage?

1) If the Inspection is done by certain sampling size?
2) If the Inspection is done 100%?
3) If defect is caught do I ask Production to rescreen past lot?
4) I have only ONE QA Inpsector on the line. When the lot is being rejected, very often the Production supervisor will stop the line and gather 10 Operators to rescreen. After rescreening, the lot will be hand over for QA to buy-off. This put the QA on pressure for shipment. What should I do?

 

[Helmut Jilling]

If your inspection is based on C=0. When you find a problem, the lot is suspect. I think you said production rescreens it. If I understood your intent correctly, if they did a 100% rescreen, and found no more defects, the lot is ok to ship. But you need to screen 100%, not just a sample.

(If you still use an AQL level approach, instead of C=0, then I have no input. )

 

[Caster]

Old School

In the shopfloor we have a QA gate to buy-off the final product before they are ship to customer. I would like to know what are the action shall be taken by Production if QA caught defect in the buy-off stage?

1) If the Inspection is done by certain sampling size?
2) If the Inspection is done 100%?
3) If defect is caught do I ask Production to rescreen past lot?
4) I have only ONE QA Inpsector on the line. When the lot is being rejected, very often the Production supervisor will stop the line and gather 10 Operators to rescreen. After rescreening, the lot will be hand over for QA to buy-off. This put the QA on pressure for shipment. What should I do?

Oh dear, you are in a no win world.

What my old boss did was eliminate QC completely. He set up work groups and made the foreman responsible for product quality. If there was a problem at the customer, the foreman had to send his guys to sort. He had to arrange the airline tickets, AND he still had to meet his production target when his guys were away fixing their mess.

Quality became a pure support function.

Crazy, stupid, idealistic, it will never work. I still have the graphs, defects went from 20,000 PPM to less than 200 and stayed there. I won't even dare to say some teams had 0 PPM because no one will believe it.

No matter how much quality nattered and whined after we got back from a sort, it wasn't real to Production. But when the foreman had a customer put a bad part in his hands and he had to look him in the eye and tell him what happened. And when they got to see the customers HUGE plant shut down, and hundreds of angry eyes were looking at them, it all got very serious indeed. I overheard one guy telling his team mates about the trip and it was intense.

People would do anything to avoid that trip, heck, even make good parts.

What my boss knew was that as long as a person has an excuse, human nature will let him use it. Hey QC is there to catch the bad stuff, we just make it.

He stopped the game dead in it's tracks. Production knows it's bad, and when it is their neck on the line, they do it right.

Sadly, when my boss retired, the next boss let all this die.

So what can you do? One small thing at a time.

Write up a procedure that says who sorts what. Get Production to agree to it.

Use an MRB process to relieve your poor inspector of the pressure to ship. Get senior managers to buy off on shipping the bad stuff.

MRB can be your friend. QC is done when the problem is found. It is up to management to assess risk and decide what to do.

QC says, don't fly the space shuttle, it is too cold for the O-rings. Let those who are paid the most take the risk and the blame. It is their responsibility.

I caution you that ideas and talk like this can get you called a trouble maker or fired. Think long and hard on your course of action please.

You are in a tough spot for sure. Good luck. I am sure you will get some better ideas from others.

 

[Helmut Jilling]

quote: What my old boss did was eliminate QC completely. He set up work groups and made the foreman responsible for product quality. If there was a problem at the customer, the foreman had to send his guys to sort. He had to arrange the airline tickets, AND he still had to meet his production target when his guys were away fixing their mess.

Quality became a pure support function.

Crazy, stupid, idealistic, it will never work. I still have the graphs, defects went from 20,000 PPM to less than 200 and stayed there. I won't even dare to say some teams had 0 PPM because no one will believe it.

No matter how much quality nattered and whined after we got back from a sort, it wasn't real to Production. But when the foreman had a customer put a bad part in his hands and he had to look him in the eye and tell him what happened. And when they got to see the customers HUGE plant shut down, and hundreds of angry eyes were looking at them, it all got very serious indeed. I overheard one guy telling his team mates about the trip and it was intense.

People would do anything to avoid that trip, heck, even make good parts.

What my boss knew was that as long as a person has an excuse, human nature will let him use it. Hey QC is there to catch the bad stuff, we just make it.

He stopped the game dead in it's tracks. Production knows it's bad, and when it is their neck on the line, they do it right.

Sadly, when my boss retired, the next boss let all this die.

BOY, I LOVE THAT!! I HAVE SUGGESTED THE SAME CONCEPT TO CLIENT, BUT IT WAS GREAT TO HEAR A REAL LIFE VERSION OF IT. IT VALIDATES MY HUNCH.

MOST DISTRESSING TO HEAR HOW THE STORY ENDS...

 

[Claes Gefvenberg]

People would do anything to avoid that trip, heck, even make good parts.

Exactly. I have seen both sides of the coin (from both the suppliers and the customers point of view), and I can only verify what you say: It works (Providing of course, that people have or get the means they need to make a flawless product - If not, it's akin to sending them on a seppku mission).

/Claes

 

[chiuinggum - 2007]

Normally customer would want to deal with QA only. They prefer one face rather than deal with Production personnel.

The factory is pushing for output to meet delivery. When there is rescreen the pressure is at always at QA gate to clear the lots. Imagine 1 QA versus 10 Production operator.

 

[Jim Wynne]

Normally customer would want to deal with QA only. They prefer one face rather than deal with Production personnel.

The factory is pushing for output to meet delivery. When there is rescreen the pressure is at always at QA gate to clear the lots. Imagine 1 QA versus 10 Production operator.

I know how frustrating this can be. The logical question is, if 10 people have screened the lot, why is more inspection necessary?

 

[Helmut Jilling]

Normally customer would want to deal with QA only. They prefer one face rather than deal with Production personnel.

The factory is pushing for output to meet delivery. When there is rescreen the pressure is at always at QA gate to clear the lots. Imagine 1 QA versus 10 Production operator.

Of course. But the idea behind this approach is that progressive companies make Production understand that they are responsible for product quality. The QA Dept. is merely the gatekeeper.

 

[chiuinggum - 2007]

I know how frustrating this can be. The logical question is, if 10 people have screened the lot, why is more inspection necessary?

QA would not be sure if Production has done a good job in the rescreening. That is why QA need to buy-off again. If there is any escapee, then QA would be 'responsible'. Question like why QA did not catch the defect.

 

[Jen Kirley]

I remember reading that the customer wants to deal with one person only.

Why not have the Production Manager be that person?

QA is being done the old fashioned way in your company, where it looks like a police function. You may manage to convincingly argue that such a structure will not be competetive with other companies, whose problems are fewer. You might succeed if you point out that your customer might become frustrated and go to other, more effectively structured manufacturer if they make fewer mistakes and are easier to do business with.

In more modern organizations, QA is a support function that advises, plans, measures for success and facilitates the problem solving and error-proofing efforts toward quality rather than to find and segregate flawed product. The winning result of such a manufacturing management structure can be dramatic, such as Caster has described.

The people in management will only understand this if they are forced to confront the problem, rather than place it on your table as though they had no part in creating the problem. Changing the way things are done must be their idea. If the Production Manager becomes the contact person, it may occur to him that the surest way to avoid such unpleasantness is to reduce defects and thus reduce their time-consuming results.

You, meanwhile, can be available to show how much money will be saved when flaws are avoided instead of acted upon. Contact me privately if you want a free calculator to perform this math.