Different strokes for different vendors
I established a supplier approval process at my former company that followed these lines : Different criteria for approving our vendors depending on the services/ products we were buying from them. The more critical (such as whether it involved personnel or whether it happened on our property), the more criteria that was required to approve them. Also established how often we had to review and renew their approval status.
Once they were approved, they were entered into an excel workbook. The front page of the workbook held an alphabetical listing of the approved vendors, with each name being a link to the associated worksheet page. The page for each vendor was a standardized form that listed the important contact information, the date of approval and date when it needed to be reviewed/renewed, the category the vendor fell into (the criticality factor), the required documents that were reviewed for the vendor, etc.
The procedure governing the supplier selection and approval process stated that a new supplier had to be sponsored by the submission of a form that was then reviewed by Quality. We didn't want umpteen suppliers for the same type of product. Companies do well to establish good relationships with critical suppliers and can bargain better pricing and service. So only two or three vendors of a particular product was all that was allowed. If Quality approved, then the rest of the process of qualifying the supplier could begin.
As far as maintaining an approved supplier list, it was the excel workbook. Just look alphabetically to see if they're there. Also easy to scan and find the ones that needed to be reviewed/renewed that year.
