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Well, I'm back and I'm still confused.
First of all, to catch up a bit, I spoke with our consultant (Michelle) and she said the $2000 fee is for the Policy Manual only. She also said it would probably be best for us to write our own Policy and Procedure Manuals and have her review them (guess that costs less)
In the meantime, my boss had been getting quotes from a few registrars, which brings me to my first terminology question: is the Registrar the person(s) who actually audit you? And hopefully approve you? Or are auditors a whole separate thing? Sometimes, in reading the literature, it seems like auditors come in and review all your manuals, procedures, etc, and present their findings to a registrar, who then either approves or disapproves you. I'm trying to figure out how many levels of humans are involved in this whole process.
Cost-wise, what a variety.....one registrar quoted a price of $9800.00, which includes an Executive Overview, Procedures flows, interviews, and outlines, Internal auditor training, Implementation assistance (forms, etc), and writing and delivering level two procedures and forms and quality manual.
This other place wants $625 for a document review, $2500 for a registration assessment, and $250 for adminstrative costs, whatever those might be. Am I interpreting this correctly - this second firm won't be writing any manuals for us?
I saw a site somewhere on the web where they were estimating costs for ISO certification, and mentioned that the cost of the actual certificate was $700. Is there such a cost? So far none of the registrars mentioned it.
Lastly (for now
), is there a directory somewhere online (or in this forum, perhaps) of registrars and their fees? I've seen a few snarky comments about some registrars, so I'm curious as to which firms would be considered "good" registrars to work with. (My boss's interpretation of a good registrar is one that knows our consultant, likes her, and will "rubber stamp" us a certificate.)
OK.....sorry to be long-winded, and thanks for reading this far!
First of all, to catch up a bit, I spoke with our consultant (Michelle) and she said the $2000 fee is for the Policy Manual only. She also said it would probably be best for us to write our own Policy and Procedure Manuals and have her review them (guess that costs less)
In the meantime, my boss had been getting quotes from a few registrars, which brings me to my first terminology question: is the Registrar the person(s) who actually audit you? And hopefully approve you? Or are auditors a whole separate thing? Sometimes, in reading the literature, it seems like auditors come in and review all your manuals, procedures, etc, and present their findings to a registrar, who then either approves or disapproves you. I'm trying to figure out how many levels of humans are involved in this whole process.
Cost-wise, what a variety.....one registrar quoted a price of $9800.00, which includes an Executive Overview, Procedures flows, interviews, and outlines, Internal auditor training, Implementation assistance (forms, etc), and writing and delivering level two procedures and forms and quality manual.
This other place wants $625 for a document review, $2500 for a registration assessment, and $250 for adminstrative costs, whatever those might be. Am I interpreting this correctly - this second firm won't be writing any manuals for us?
I saw a site somewhere on the web where they were estimating costs for ISO certification, and mentioned that the cost of the actual certificate was $700. Is there such a cost? So far none of the registrars mentioned it.
Lastly (for now
OK.....sorry to be long-winded, and thanks for reading this far!