Supplier Evaluation and Approval forms - Discussion and Evaluation Examples

[Al the Elf]

Risky behaviour ?

I've never had the guts to do it, but I suppose the answer is go back to the customer who's asked for the useless information and ask them if they really need it, pointing out that you'd prefer not to waste time which is only costing them money in the long run !

Anybody tried this, or it's closely related cousin - ignoring the request completely ?

In my experience most of the Claes type repeat year in, year out merchants don't have any real influence over you being a supplier or not anyway.

 

[Claes Gefvenberg]

I have tried the first and third way....

Alternative A: Oh yes, in spite of being a very shy person I have on occasion asked customers why they need certain information...

Alternative B: No I have never completely ignored a survey.

Alternative C: Sometimes I leave fields in the survey blank, and wait for the issuer to contact me for additional info.... Well, it never happened.

What all this boils down to is that even if you have only a couple of hundred customers and each of them send you a survey every year, and each survey takes half an hour to fill in and return (Which is not in any way unusual).... Well, that's 100 hours down the drain.

Is it reasonable?

/Claes

 

[energy]

Worth it?

We have a Customer from 2 years ago that purchased a 150K-200K system that never fails to send out a survey every year. They want Lost time injury rates, copies of our OSHA200 Log (Now OSHA 300 for those who may want to correct me ) as just a small part of a 15 page questionaire. We take to that task with the same furvor we would existing or potential Customers. You never know when they may want to Purchase again.
As someone who would review our Supplier's Survey Form, no-we haven't started that yet, I would view an incomplete form or no response at all with disappointment. Such a disappointment that I would bring all the pressures to bear, through Purchasing and Accounting to get them to respond. Unless they make a one of a kind product, Purchasing would be pressed to go another Supplier who treats his Customer like we treat our Customers. I agree that I wouldn't do it if we didn't have to. There are other ways to measure Supplier's performance. The head count isn't sufficient to justify an alternate method of proving that you keep in touch with your Suppliers. Let's face it, no matter what the survey says, NC's, Late Delivery, Price, etc. really dictate the status of the Supplier. It's just an acceptable method of gauging your Supplier's QMS, as they see it. Could be BS? Could be. You would know that by the nature of their product and service.

I once reviewed a survey that had N/A in approx. 90% of the form. We knew what they did for us, not one recorded NC and all the other nice things a good Supplier does. It was accepted and filed away. They didn't ignore it or leave blank spaces. Perception that you respect your Customer's efforts to satisfy some requirement goes a long way towards good Customer/Supplier relationships. Isn't that expected of us in the new standard?
So, fill them out boys and girls. Take the time, take them seriously and you may never know that the next order from them was because you showed the Customer due respect. JMHO

 

[Mike S.]

Re: Worth it?

energy said:

I once reviewed a survey that had N/A in approx. 90% of the form. We knew what they did for us, not one recorded NC and all the other nice things a good Supplier does. It was accepted and filed away. They didn't ignore it or leave blank spaces. Perception that you respect your Customer's efforts to satisfy some requirement goes a long way towards good Customer/Supplier relationships. Isn't that expected of us in the new standard?

Energy,

Just curious. Why did you send a survey to a supplier who had already demonstrated excellent capability. As you said, the actions speak louder than the check marks on a survey. Maybe just to get some of the contact info, etc.??? One of my ways to qualify/approve a supplier when we implemented our QMS was based on previously demonstrated performance. Only new suppliers got a survey or visit.

 

[energy]

Because

With over 300 Suppliers, it's the easiest way to communicate. We do not have the manpower at this time to do it any other way. Where I worked before, a Customer Auditor for an Aircraft Company randomly selected 5 Suppliers and asked to see the Supplier Evaluation forms. 4 of the 5 were okay. The fifth was an excellent Supplier that failed to respond. My boss, the QA Mgr explained how good they were, showed the Vendor's history since their last response. It took about an hour to prove the Supplier measured up. I would not want the task to do that with every supplier we intend to have in our pool. Part of the Correction Action cited by the Customer was to get that good supplier to respond to the accepted method of checking up on our Suppliers. Call me old school. I don't care if the Supplier was golden. They know it's part of doing business with us. If we had all 5 Supplier Surveys in our files in my other life, that part of the audit would have taken 5 minutes. Does it prove anything? No. Is it an accepted way to demonstrate that you have contacted all your suppliers and leave your auditor something else to root around for? Absolutely. As I said, that's me. As the original post was for an example of a Supplier Survey form, I just thought I would re-enforce the fact that it is perfectly acceptable to perform the exercise that way.
Hey, leave me alone. It's funky Friday! 4 hours and counting.

 

[Mike S.]

Energy,

Do you send the survey yearly or only once if the vendor performs well after that?

I promise -- no more questions then on this "Funky Friday"!

 

[energy]

My plan

As I have not done that here, yet, I was speaking from previous employment. Purchasing is presently tasked with that effort, but is looking to me for advice. I would lean towards something between 18 months to two years. When we did them annually, allowing for sufficient time for the Supplier to make it a priority, sometimes the stragglers took three months. Particularly if you haven't purchased from them for awhile. Where's their motivation? Before you know it, it was time to send them again. Annually, I believe, dilutes what little importance placed on them. I can tell you that my ex-boss went 2 1/2 years before sending them again. And that was only because we knew we were going through a round of audits, shortly. Words like periodically come to mind. This way you are not tied down to a timeframe. As I said, these forms are only a small part of Supplier Evaluation. The other things we discussed are in your face every day and will suffice in between surveys. Our CA 5 database develops Pareto Charts for who the worst supplier is, the type of nonconformance and repeat offenses. SCAR's are issued to those suppliers. To show you how little of those are issued, my top number is 0007. I'm easy.

 

[Sam]

We are in that same loop of sending out survey requests. We are presently changing our process to require the following:

1- require a sample with supporting data from each new supplier,prior to acceptance of the first order.
2- require a sample with supporting data from each existing supplier as time permits.
3- request supporting data with each shipment,
4- Select suppliers that are 9k2k or TS registered, when possible.
5- Request a status report on third party surveillance audits from those suppliers that are registered,
6- Submit a quarterly rating to each supplier.(This will take some work)

 

[energy]

We would, too

Sam,

Unfortunately, a large majority of our components can be purchased from Home Depot, Lowes, Sears and any place that sells plumbing supplies. Very difficult to ask for and get traceability in pvc elbows, tees and pipe. Our Customers do not require it. When there is traceability requirements for stainless steel systems, they too can be purchased from many Suppliers who send chems & phys reports as a matter of routine. We are strictly commercial, custom and standard water treatment systems and components. Got to do what is most convenient for your place and type of work. ISO certification is being driven by the CEO because he feels we will get better organized and believes it is a valuable marketing tool. We have no plans to ask Suppliers to get registered. It's interesting to note that a couple of big ticket companies are Registered and have as many N/C's as those that aren't. But they are prompt with replying to the few SCAR's I sent them!

 

[Todd_w]

I’ve read through this thread – it’s good stuff.

We are in the midst of pondering whether to keep a list of suppliers with ISO certification. Being in the chemical business, most companies are ISO certified anyway. One can ask each company whether or not they are certified or go to worldpreferred.com and look it up. But why am I doing this? If they are providing the raw material according to all the requirements, we will buy from them regardless of their ISO status.

Our Sourcing Department would like to handle supplier evaluation in this way:
- Once a supplier ships material that meets our requirements and the material performs as expected, that supplier is approved.
- Any quality problems that arise after that are captured by our SCAR system
- Evaluation of the supplier is gauged quarterly by reviewing the SCAR system

Will this satisfy the “intent” of 7.4.1 and the new “reevaluation “verbiage?

Thanks in advance for any opinions on this subject.