Understanding The ISO/TS 16949:2002 Standard 

8.2    Monitoring and Measurement  

8.2.1 Customer Satisfaction 

You shall 

Monitor information based on customer perception of whether the organization has met customer requirements 

Determine methods to obtain and use information

Use customer satisfaction as a measure of QMS performance 

Note: Consider both internal & external customers 

8.2.1.1 Customer Satisfaction - supplemental 

You shall monitor customer satisfaction by continually evaluating performance of realization processes through: 

Delivered part quality performance 

Customer disruptions including field returns 

Delivery schedule performance (including incidents of premium freight) 

Customer notification of quality or delivery issues 

You shall monitor manufacturing process performance for product quality & process efficiency, in meeting customer requirements 

Key Explanation Points and Tips:

Þ      Customers are primarily the end users of your product, but also include intermediaries such as assemblers (internal or external) who integrate your product into theirs, and dealers and distributors who market and sell your product or the integrated product. You need to consider feedback from all these customers to determine whether or not you have met their specified and perceived requirements.  

Þ      Customer requirements may relate to the design, manufacture, delivery, servicing, and customer and technical support of product; QMS; communication and financial requirements; etc. you must have controls to identify and meet these requirements (see clauses 7.1 – 7.6).  

Þ      The ISO 9000:2005 standard defines customer satisfaction as - the customer’s perception of the degree to which the customer’s requirements have been fulfilled. The phrase ‘the degree’ implies the use of a qualitative or quantitative measure that customers can use to rate to what extent or degree your performance met their expectations and requirements, e.g. supplier score cards; alpha or numeric rating scales on survey forms; etc. 

Þ      There are many other ways to monitor customer satisfaction feedback (positive and negative). These may include – customer complaints; direct communications with customers; questionnaires and surveys; subcontracted collection and analysis of performance data (see clause 8.4); reports from consumer organizations; reports in various media; sector and industry studies. 

Þ      You must continually gather information (about these requirements), capable of being analyzed and evaluated to determine how well you performed them. There are all kinds of performance indicators for design, manufacture, delivery, etc. Gather information on these indicators from both the customer as well from internal processes.  

Þ      You are expected to have a process that defines your customer satisfaction indicators; frequency and method of data collection; summarization, review and evaluation of data; actions to improve, timeline, responsibility and follow-up (see 5.6 management review. 

Þ      Many OEM’s and tier 1 suppliers routinely provide feedback on some or all of the information in clause 8.2.1.1.  You must continuously review this customer feedback to ensure you maintain and improve your customer satisfaction rating. Review specific requirements for customer satisfaction at OEM customer or IATF websites. 

Þ      ‘Delivered part delivery performance’ relates to reduction in PPM defect rates. ‘Customer disruptions’ relate to temporary interruption or shutdown of your customers production or service operations that was caused by product quality or delivery problems from your organization.  

Þ      ‘Delivery schedule performance’ relates to product or service delivery that is not early or late, but just in time based on customer scheduling requirements. Premium freight whether paid by you or the customer to expedite on-time delivery is a non-value added cost that must be prevented. You are required to track premium freight costs and take corrective action if it is a significant cost or occurs frequently. 

Þ      Automotive OEM’s may impose a temporary halt on shipments from a supplier experiencing poor quality or delivery performance. You must take corrective action to eliminate the problems and their causes, following customer prescribed controls and measures, before you are allowed to resume production and delivery of the customer’s product. In many cases, third party audit and customer approvals are required to remove the ‘halt’. Also review specific requirements for customer hold/halt shipment rules and CB notification at OEM customer or IATF websites. 

Þ      You must also consider performance indicators that improve the efficiency of your manufacturing processes. These may relate to lean manufacturing tools such as – ANDON procedures; direct run first time quality results; lead time reduction; level scheduling; number of error-proofing opportunities implemented; planned maintenance; standardized work; workplace organization and visual controls deployed.  

Þ      You must monitor trends in customer satisfaction indicators and use these as a baseline for continual improvement. You should consider both external as well as internal customer satisfaction. Note that every internal process is either a customer or supplier of another process. 

Þ      If any or all of your customer satisfaction process activities are done off-site, you must still identify this as a QMS process and show the interaction with the offsite organization (head office perhaps) in addressing these requirements and show how customer feedback information from Head office is used by you for continual improvement and enhancing customer satisfaction.  

Þ      Clause 8.2.1 does not require a ‘documented’ procedure. However, you must identify and document the process addressing this clause as part of your QMS (see clause 4.1). For this process, you must also identify what specific documents, controls and resources are needed (see clause 4.2.1d. and 7.1b.). You could use a documented procedure or other combination of specific practices, procedures, documents and methods. Look at the risks and benefits in determining the extent of documented controls you need to have (also see clause 4.2.1 notes).  

Þ      Performance indicators (to measure the effectiveness of processes that control customer satisfaction may include – improvement in customer feedback ratings; reduction in customer complaints; increase in the number of customers providing feedback; increase in feedback that leads to QMS and product improvement opportunities.