You will need to identify those materials and services you buy which can affect the quality of your product ands/or service. You will then need to select from suppliers who can supply those materials and services, those you intend to use. Remember that sub-contracted services such as design, transport and delivery, calibration services, etc. may affect quality and may need to be considered. In other words you need to control your purchasing procedures (clause 7.4.1)

Most businesses usually have a number of reasons why they deal with a particular supplier. You can continue to use existing suppliers when developing your quality management system. The standard simply requires that selection be carried out in a controlled manner.

When you decide why a particular supplier is to be used, you should write down the criteria and basis for the selection. Questions you may wish to ask in selecting suppliers may include one or more of the following:

• How reliable are they?
• Can they supply what you want?
• Do they have the necessary resources? e.g. equipment and staff.
• Is the quoted delivery time and price acceptable?
• Do they have a quality management system to ISO 9000-2000 or similar?
• Have you used them before successfully?
• Have they a good business reputation?

Where a propriety or brand name product is to be purchased, an obvious source may be a wholesale or retail outlet offering an off-the-shelf or self-selection service. A wide range of products are available from such sources, such as electrical supplies, plumbing supplies, general engineering supplies, food and catering services, etc.

In these circumstances, the criteria for supplier selection and the associated records may be minimal.

You may wish to consider buying for a trial period, with a review at the end of the period to establish the acceptability of the supplied product and/or service or the supplier.

As well as maintaining records of approved suppliers and basis of approval, you should also regularly monitor the performance of those suppliers to ensure that they still meet the selection criteria. However, if you are a small business, you need to be aware that your purchasing power is limited, and threats to remove suppliers from your supplier approval system may be ineffectual. This is particularly true where you are obtaining product and/or service from very large national or international organisations. Of course, if you are a large organisation then you will have a great deal of purchasing power. Your quality manual needs to reflect the real life situation.

The extent to which you monitor supplier’s performance depends on how critical the product and/or service being supplied is to the quality of your product and/or service.

For example, in a printing business, the paper quality could be critical. A travel agency might use normal, commercial stationery, which would not need any quality related purchasing controls.

The printing business may monitor the performance of its paper suppliers very closely to ensure the quality of its printed product and/or service remains at the expected level.

In order to get what you need, the purchase instructions should leave no doubt of what it is you want. Instructions are preferably given as a written order. Remember that telephoned instructions are open to misunderstanding by your supplier and you may need to take additional precautions to ensure that your instructions are understood. Irrespective of whether the order is written or verbal, you will need to keep a record of what was ordered so you can confirm you got what you asked for.

The standard deals (clause 7.4.2) deals with the details that you should include, as appropriate, in advising your purchase requirements. The extent to which the details apply depends on the extent that the goods and services being ordered affect the main business and the quality of your product and/or service.

It is essential that all relevant details of the items of services wanted be clearly stated at the time of ordering. These may include drawing, catalogue or model numbers and required delivery date and place. In some cases, a catalogue number, or a part number may cover the complete description. While it is essential to fully describe what you want, unnecessary detail can lead to misunderstanding and incorrect delivery.

The written purchase order should be checked prior to issue. In a small business, it would probably be the person who does the buying who would do the checking for adequacy. This may simply involve reading the order, initialling and dating it.

Most businesses have some form of incoming measurement and monitoring, even if it is simply an employee checking the delivery docket and signing it to confirm that goods were delivered. A further check is that the goods are what were ordered. However, you need to decide whether who should inspect the goods and services you receive, and how. Clause 7.4.3 of the standard covers this.

Where a supplier has a quality management system in place, it may be possible to reduce the extent of measurement and monitoring.

The extent of measurement and monitoring also depends on the nature of the goods being received; e.g. the inspection of office supplies may be simply a verification that the quantity ordered was delivered. The delivery docket, signed by the employee, may be all the documentation required.

If you order goods or services, or both, from a supplier, and wish to inspect the goods or services, or both, at the supplier’s premises, the arrangements for such an inspection need to be agreed and included in your order. Some examples of this requirement are:

• An interior decorator viewing curtain fabrics before taking delivery;
• Do-it-yourself purchasing at wholesale or retail outlets;
• Monitoring employees being trained at a training organisation.

If your customer wants to visit your supplier’s premises to check product and/or service, this needs to be stated in both the customer’s order to you and in your order to the supplier.

Whether or not the customer actually does this, you are still responsible for ensuring that all products and/or services obtained from suppliers meet the requirements of the customer’s order.

Occasions may arise where the customer gives you material or equipment to be used in producing the items or delivering the service. Examples could include:

• A dressmaker being provided with material the customer wants made up into a dress;
• A roll of film provided for a film processor to develop and provide prints;
• A landscape gardener being provided with the stone flagging which is to form the pathways;
• Instruments provided by the customer for measurement purposes;
• tools;
• training room provided by the customer;
• a motor vehicle left for service or repair;
• a domestic appliance, e.g. a washing machine, left for repair.

While a documented procedure is no longer required as in the 1994 version of the standard, the organisation is responsible for ensuring that the control of customer property (clause 7.5.4 of the standard) is sufficiently documented to describe how it is identified and cared for. The document could simply reference other in-house processes you use, such as clause 8.2.3 Measurement and monitoring of processes and clause 7.5.5 Preservation of product.

You have to tell the customer if their property is damaged, lost or otherwise unsuitable for use.