Self Proclamation of ISO 9001 Certification and Compliance

[Jim Wynne]

As for my car analogy, let me take another stab, and see if you agree with my logic. Let us set aside whether the car is actually safe to drive (as setting aside whether an organization really has a good quality system), you want an inspection sticker to satisfy law enforcement.

This makes more sense to me now. I hadn't stopped to think about states where safety inspections are mandatory.

If you are doing these assessments yourself, you have no objectivity to assert compliance to any standard. So to me, they are worthless.

Here's where we disagree, I think. I think I'm perfectly capable of objective appraisal of any quality system I've ever had a hand in designing. I need to make an objective appraisal before calling in the registrar, no? So why can't I make an objective appraisal and skip the second step?

 

[vanputten]

Helo All:

I think some of the debate and confusion is becasue terms have not been defined. 4+ pages of postings and only some have begun to define terms. There is a reference to the Wiki for definitions.

I think the OP is asking for rules on self declaration of compliance, not certification or registration.

What do the following mean?

Accrediation
Certification
Compliance
Conformance
Registration

And then put the word "self" in front of them.

I have pasted below the definitions from the Cove Wiki. I am not sure the defintions help.


From the Cove Wiki:

Accreditation - Certification by a duly recognized body of the facilities, capability, objectivity, competence, and integrity of an agency, service or operational group or individual to provide the specific service(s) or operation(s) needed.

Certificate of Compliance - A document signed by an authorised party affirming that the supplier of a product or service has met the requirements of the relevant specifications, contract, or regulation.

Certificate of Conformance (certificate of conformity) - A document signed by an authorized party affirming that a product or service has met the requirements of the relevant specifications, contract, or regulation.

Certification - The procedure and action by a duly authorized body of determining, verifying, and attesting in writing to the qualifications of personnel, processes, procedures, or items in accordance with applicable requirements.

Certification Audits - Audits relating to registration (e.g., ISO 9000 audits).

Compliance and Affirmative - Indication or judgment that the supplier of a product or service has met the requirements of the relevant specifications, contract, or regulation; also the state of meeting the requirements

Conformance - (1) A dimension of quality that refers to the extent to which a product lies within an allowable range of deviation from its specification. (2) An affirmative indication or judgment that a product or service has met the requirements of the relevant specifications, contract, or regulation; also the state of meeting the requirements.

Registration - no definition

Regards,

Dirk

 

[Randy]

Actually Registration is the entering of an organization into a "Register" and that's where the term "Registrar" comes from.

 

[vanputten]

I received the following information from Dennis Arter (the Audit Guy, www.auditguy.net.)

Dennis asked me to remind Covers that the following are his interpretations of the standards and their history. Dennis has a lot of history to offer in this discussion.


From Dennis:
Conformance deals with product characteristics (form, fit, function) and can
be determined through inspection and test. The key word here is PRODUCT.
This was the original idea behind conformity assessment, which grew out of
the need in international trade to find a trusted, neutral party, to
determine if a shipload of grain, for example, should be accepted. It
started under GATT and is now used all over the world under WTO.
Unfortunately, when the concept was applied to systems in the 1980s, they
continued to use the same nomenclature.

Compliance adds the elements of process and system to product. Not only is
the item conforming, as determined through inspection, but it was produced
in accordance with approved process procedures and under an approved system. Nobody (in their right mind) should ever sign a Certificate of Compliance, as it is a best guess at most.

Certification is the act of declaring someone or something CONFORMING. It
involves measurement and test, with actual QC data to back it up.
Registration is the act of declaring an organization in COMPLIANCE with a
set of rules. When it involves actual demonstration of technical competence,
it is called Accreditation. When the Europeans refer to Certification, they
are referring to the piece of paper and actually mean registration.

How one wishes to use these words in their firm is entirely up to them. No
committee has the right or authority to say otherwise, except when it comes
to PRODUCT. You can declare product to be conforming to a technical
specification or standard, providing you have QC data behind the statement.
You cannot declare product in compliance, unless you can back it up with
hard data, which is impossible to do. You can declare your management
systems and processes to be in compliance, if you have good (judgement word) internal reports and audits to back up the statement.

The most common terminology is to say, "We are compliant to [standard xxx]."
That standard may be a requirement or guidance document.

The registrars do this every day, by requiring their audit programs to be
compliant to ISO 19011. As you know, that is a guidance document."

Regards,

Dirk

 

[Paul Simpson]

Actually Registration is the entering of an organization into a "Register" and that's where the term "Registrar" comes from.

Spot on, Randy. Under one or more of the ISO / IEC guides (I'm sure someone can help me with which) the certification body is required to maintain a register of those organizations it has issued a certificate to. Hence some organizations offer a "certificate of registration" and the organizations become a "registered firm."

BTW I prefer certification body to registrar - anyone else have a preference?

 

[Randy]

Thank you Paul...

Here in the states the term certifiy more often than not carries with it the legal overtones of absoluteness thus the preference for the Registration of a system as opposed to the Certification. Sounds dumb but with a million starving lawyers it's another method of risk management.

 

[chergh - 2008]

BTW I prefer certification body to registrar - anyone else have a preference?

Don't care to be honest, I consider the terms to be analogous with each other and the meaning is usually clear irrespective of the term used.

 

[Paul Simpson]

Thank you Paul...

Here in the states the term certifiy more often than not carries with it the legal overtones of absoluteness thus the preference for the Registration of a system as opposed to the Certification. Sounds dumb but with a million starving lawyers it's another method of risk management.

Hey, Randy. Thanks - you made my day. Getting to use "starving" and "lawyers" in the same sentence.

 

[Jim Wynne]

Dennis asked me to remind Covers that the following are his interpretations of the standards and their history. Dennis has a lot of history to offer in this discussion.

Emphasis added to highlight the fact that Mr. Arter is apparently making up his own definitions.

Conformance deals with product characteristics (form, fit, function) and can be determined through inspection and test. The key word here is PRODUCT...

Compliance adds the elements of process and system to product. Not only is the item conforming, as determined through inspection, but it was produced in accordance with approved process procedures and under an approved system. Nobody (in their right mind) should ever sign a Certificate of Compliance, as it is a best guess at most...

Certification is the act of declaring someone or something CONFORMING. It
involves measurement and test, with actual QC data to back it up.
Registration is the act of declaring an organization in COMPLIANCE with a
set of rules...

When it involves actual demonstration of technical competence,
it is called Accreditation. When the Europeans refer to Certification, they
are referring to the piece of paper and actually mean registration.

Maybe it's me, but I got lost somewhere in the middle of those definitions and was unable to find my way back out again. Fact: "conformance" and "compliance" are synonymous for all intents and purposes, unless there are codified normative definitions that say otherwise. Is Arter saying that if I say my product is in compliance with the specifications, he might not know what I mean? And what about Arter's definition of "conformance"? Is he saying that it's somehow different from the ISO use of "conformity"?

How one wishes to use these words in their firm is entirely up to them.

Unless, as I suggested before, there's some normative requirement that dictates definitions.

No committee has the right or authority to say otherwise

Of course they do, but only if one agrees to it, as would be the case in an ISO registration (or even compliance) process.

...except when it comes to PRODUCT. You can declare product to be conforming to a technical specification or standard, providing you have QC data behind the statement.

I don't know what Arter means by "technical specification," but I can certainly certify that my product is in compliance with specifications and that it conforms with customer expectations and not fear that anyone won't know what I'm talking about.

You cannot declare product in compliance, unless you can back it up with hard data, which is impossible to do.

Sorry, but this makes no sense, even using Arter's definition of "compliance." Maybe he was in a hurry. Putting the statement another way, he seems to be saying, "In order to claim 'compliance' of a product, you need hard data, and it's impossible for hard data to exist."

One of the things that really irks me is people who want to take reasonably simple ideas, put them through a grinder, and render them incoherent. "Compliance" and "conformance" mean the same thing, and it doesn't help anything to try to assign meanings to them that they don't need. If you want to know what a word means, look in a good dictionary, and never stray from standard definitions without dam good reason for doing so. Making up your own definitions is a recipe for confusion, fear and loathing.

 

[Jim Wynne]

Also see this discussion thread for another interesting observation from Mr. Arter.