Also called ISO 9001 certification, quality management system, QMS, registrar
What is ISO 9001?
The international standard for a quality management system, and the certificate customers ask to see.
What else it is called
- Other names
- ISO 9001 certification, quality management system, QMS, registrar
- In French
- ISO 9001
Related entries
Understanding ISO 9001
The international standard for a quality management system. It is widely misunderstood as a product standard, and it is not: it says nothing about tolerances, materials or methods. What it requires is that you have determined how your work gets done, documented it where documentation matters, follow it, measure whether the outcome was acceptable, and act when it was not.
Certification is granted by an independent registrar following an audit, maintained through surveillance audits on a three-year cycle, and the registrar’s own competence is accredited - in Canada, through the Standards Council of Canada. Buyers asking for your certificate are checking that an outside party has looked, not that your parts are good.
Sector schemes build on it rather than replacing it: the automotive quality standard and the aerospace one both take the ISO 9001 structure and add requirements. If your customers are in those sectors, the base certificate is a starting point rather than the destination.
In practice
For a great many Canadian manufacturers this certificate is the price of being allowed to quote at all, particularly to automotive, aerospace and government buyers.
Frequently asked
How long does certification take?
For a small manufacturer starting from documented but informal practice, commonly six to twelve months to the certification audit, and the time goes into writing down what you do and generating enough records to demonstrate you do it. Buying a template set shortens the writing and not the records.
Does certification mean our quality is good?
It means your system is consistent and audited. A plant can be certified and ship defects, and a plant can make excellent parts with no certificate. What the certificate reliably tells a buyer is that there is a documented process and a record trail to follow when something goes wrong.