Currently, with the globalization of the markets, one of the transcendental factors for the success of a company in the market is the Quality of its products or services. In recent decades there has been a worldwide trend on the part of customers towards more demanding requirements regarding Quality. At the same time, there is a growing awareness that, in order to obtain a good economic performance, it is necessary to systematically improve the Quality.
This is how the products present and manage international marketing and manufacturing standards, which allow them to comply with requirements and regulations in the market where they enter. Every day this trend of demanding these standards grows in all countries, which is why it appears as a need to achieve an international Certification to be able to maintain competitiveness by complying with international standards, which will allow us to grow and venture into other markets.
ISO is the International Organization for Standardization (International Organization for Standardization) created this word in London in 1946, currently its headquarters in Geneva; Switzerland.
The main objective of ISO is to promote the development of international standards and related activities, including their conformity to facilitate the exchange of goods and services throughout the world. ISO created in 1987 the ISO 9000 standardization series based on the elements of the British norms BS 5750 (British Standard Institute, BSI.).
It should be noted that these international standards are flexible because it allows if it is necessary to adapt them either by adding or subtracting components or requirements of the quality system in certain specific circumstances, that is, the standard does not intend to establish a uniformity of quality systems, on the contrary it is recognized in Said standard the variety to adjust to the changing needs of each industry.
The certification of quality procedures in Companies that offer either goods and services or both to a certain market, represents in any circumstance a better strategic positioning compared to the rest of the competitors that have not yet carried out this process. These competitive advantages that the Company manages to achieve after a Certification can be summarized as three very significant components:
- Flexibility. It is reflected with the decrease in times in product deliveries. Costs. It allows the elaboration of products or services with competitive prices. Quality. In products and services that meet the satisfaction of customer needs, preferences and expectations.
Therefore we can keep customers satisfied and with it a better positioning in the market.
The ISO 9000 certification for a certain Company does not guarantee the total elimination of failures in its internal process, but rather offers effective systematized methods and procedures to determine the causes of the problems and then correct them, preventing them from recurring again through the weather.
According to the procedures established in the ISO, all the standards, including the standards, must be reviewed at least every five years at the most to determine if they should be maintained, revised or canceled. The 1994 version of the standards belonging to the ISO 9000 family was revised by the ISO-TC 176 Technical Committee, and was officially published on December 15, 2000 (ISO 9000-VERSION 2000.
The ISO 9000 family is made up of ISO 9000 and ISO 9004, also known as ISO 9000-1 and ISO 9000-4 documents. The core of the ISO 9000 to ISO 9004 series consists of three standards of quality assurance model 9001, 9002 and 9003, hierarchically the ISO 9001 standard is greater than that of ISO 9002 and this in turn is greater that the ISO 9003 standard; The rest of the standards refer to the support guidelines in quality control and the audit process.
The three models of the quality systems are used to verify compliance with the requirements requested by the corresponding standard, as well as to verify the approval or registration in the case of suppliers:
- ISO 9001. Model of Quality Assurance in the design, development, production, installation and after-sales service. In other words, when it is necessary to demonstrate the supplier's ability to assume all responsibility from design to after-sales service in such a way that supply is prevented in all non-conforming production stages. ISO 9002. Quality assurance model in the production, installation and after-sales service. That is, when it is necessary to demonstrate the capacity of a supplier to assume all responsibility from an established design to after-sales service in such a way as to prevent the supply of the production of non-conforming products. ISO 9003. quality in inspection and final tests.That is, when it is necessary to demonstrate the ability of a supplier to detect and control the treatment of any non-conformity of a product in the final inspection and testing stages.
Finally we can conclude that the implementation of ISO 9000 also allows us to order, control, verify and correct if any deficiency in our management system is necessary, and also allows us to have a traceability of the product that is very important in after-sales services to have a quick response to a customer complaint in product identification.
