For a good buyer-supplier relationship audits are becoming important these days. Because it aims to check and make improvements to existing delivery and quality processes. Required to follow the ISO standards, audits in supply industry can be important for the yearly evaluation of the supplier companies.
Benefits of Audits in Supplier Companies
Here are some of the top benefits of audits in supplier companies:
- Development skills of suppliers can be compared and documented
- Quality related costs and risks of suppliers can be reduced
- Make sure that you have an established efficient and functional QMS(Quality Management System).
- You should have a documentation of optimization processes to make sure that the quality of the product and raw material is excellent
- A good communication system between the buyers and suppliers strengthens the long-term business relationship
- Collecting All the Information from the Supplier
Firstly, you need to collect all the information and documents, which was already exchanged between you and the supplier company like contacts, complaints, work instructions, or delivery specifications. All these documents should be filed and requested in advance by the supplier company.
- Preparing the List for Audit Execution
These are some of the aspects which should be checked and reviewed for a Quality inspection services. All the below-mentioned pointers can be considered as a basis for audits of supplier companies:
- Inspection: Are you having a plan for quality management? Are the defective parts marked, identified, stored properly, and replaced
- Reliability of the Delivery: Evaluating the reliability on the basis of QA(Quality Assurance) agreements: Is the system traceable? Are there any back up plans in case of emergency?
- Testing Equipments and Instruments: Are the used testing equipments and the current testing instruments suitable? Are those working according to your standards
- Qualification of an Employee: Are the employees in the supplier company qualified, regularly informed regarding safety instructions, and are motivated
- Overall Communication: Communication is important to know about the information procedure, security features for data protection, and what are the operating systems used to run the machines
- Initial Impression of the Production: What is the current condition of the production. Also, check its cleanliness, organization, and storage are according to defined standards or not
- Installing Machinery, Equipments, and Manufacturing: Are the plans for service and regulations put into action? Or what is the condition of the machinery.
- Execution of Audits
By using the above-mentioned checklist, you can easily make the differences between the current situation and the desired one. Moreover, the audits can also be performed by the customers themselves or by an external organization.
- Following-Up Audits
In order to complete an audit process, you should have a final meeting with the Third party inspection company. By following all the ISO standards, the customer has to keep the checklist separate and available for the supplier company. The audit company will provide you the solutions on how you can improve the quality of your production and delivery. The supplier company will complete those tasks within the given period of time.
