Each organization providing parts for automotive clients (OEM’s – original equipment manufacturers) should be aware that in case of quality or logistic problems, the customer can start the activity with a special status, which is in practice associated with lack of compliance with the requirements of 9.1.2.1 IATF – customer satisfaction – supplement.
As a result of the above, the certification body (CB) may inform a given production plant about the need to a special audit perform, which is connected with the suspension of certification and in the case of some special statuses (e.g. New Business on Hold used, among others, by Stellantis xFCA, Ford and VW) will additionally result in issuing a major non-conformity.
For this reason, it is worth remembering about a few elements that will allow the organization to better prepare for such an audit. The diagram illustrating the graph is presented below.
If there is a situation in which the organization is informed of the need to perform a special audit, management should decide whether the suspension of certification is appropriate and whether to protest it directly by contacting the OEM client representative to work out a dialogue for de-escalation process initiation.
If approved by the organization, a special audit should be carried out as soon as possible, as other customers are also informed that the certification at the production site is suspended and they can perform their own audits at the supplier’s location. This is because customers have access via the appropriate platform to receive such notifications directly from the Certification Bodies (CB).
In practice, it looks like that if a client (for example GM) informs the organization about the introduction of a special status related to an special audit performing, then after some time the organization may receive information from another client who has also been notified of this fact, that he would like to carry out the appropriate verification at the manufacturing plant as well.
Implemented actions approval for positive special audit output
Before the auditor’s visit, it is also worth obtaining formal approval of the implemented actions (or actions to be implemented). This is an additional argument for a positive audit conclusion.
Thanks to this, we gain both credibility and shortening the duration of the completion of a special audit. Form of approval actions can have a different character, which include:
– report from client’s visit in the production plant with summary of the implemented actions
– report from the visit to the customer’s production plant; in such a scenario, it has to be remembered to write down an appropriate note from the meeting as evidence of the agreements made between the parties, which can then be presented during the special audit
– report from the teleconference with information about the persons who participated in the meeting from client and the organization side with the relevant agreements.
To summarize, a special audit can cause big problems in an organization, therefore, acting preventively, it is worth to carefully read and familiarize with the requirements of individual customers (OEM’s), which are mainly defined in “customer specific requirements”.
