Living on ISO Time

Scott Paton
spaton@qualitydigest.com

As I reminded readers in last month's column, companies registered to one of the ISO 9000:1994 standards have until Dec. 14 to make the transition to ISO 9001:2000; otherwise they'll lose their registrations. There hasn't been much progress in the number of companies making the transition. As of mid-January only 12 percent of the total number of registrations in North America were to ISO 9001:2000. As of mid-February, that number had increased by only one point to 13 percent.

Procrastinators take notice: Bob King, president of the Registrar Accreditation Board, confirms the Dec. 14 deadline. "There are absolutely no discussions being held regarding an extension of the deadline," he recently told me.

I also spoke with Jack West recently about the small number of completed transitions. West is the U.S. chairman of TC 176, officially known as Technical Committee 176 on Quality Management and Quality Assurance--the committee responsible for developing the ISO 9000 series of standards and guidance documents.

West cites three issues affecting the ISO 9001:2000 transition: an incremental approach to the transition, organizational dropout and the automotive industry supply base.

He believes that many of the organizations currently registered to one of the 1994 versions of the standard are using their existing processes and procedures and audit cycles to transition incrementally. Many companies may be just one or two surveillance audits away from completing the transition, West says. If true, we could see a large number of ISO 9001:2000 certificates issued by year's end.

King agrees. He expects, based on input from the International Association of Accredited Registrars, to see many companies complete the transition by the deadline. "Small to medium-sized registrars should be able to get all of their clients to make the transition by the deadline," he projects. "Large registrars--the top 10--should be close to complete, maybe 20 percent away."

In my opinion, it's unrealistic to expect to see 80 percent of the registered companies complete the transition; there simply isn't enough time or resources available.

West also admits that a certain percentage of companies simply won't make the transition either due to lack of interest or lack of market pressure. "Some companies aren't serious about registration or don't see pressure from their suppliers to keep their registrations," he says. "For those that aren't serious, I say 'good riddance.' "

I agree, and I don't think he's just being flippant. It's well-known that certain registrars have tarnished ISO 9000's reputation by rubber-stamping registrations. There are also a lot of registered companies that jumped on the ISO 9000 bandwagon because it was "the thing to do" or because a supplier required it. They never used the process to drive improvement.

The automotive industry's own quality management system requirements--first QS-9000 and now ISO/TS 16949--have also affected the transition process, according to West. Because a registration to QS-9000 includes automatic registration to ISO 9001:1994, which doesn't expire for QS-9000-registered companies until 2006, many automotive suppliers have no incentive to make the Dec. 14 deadline. Currently, there are more than 9,000 sites in North America registered to QS-9000.

If you're interested in keeping tabs on the number of registered companies and their progress toward transition, you can visit Quality Digest's ISO 9000 Registered Company Database, available online at www.qualitydigest.com. In addition, beginning with this issue, we'll be publishing a "Countdown to ISO 9001:2000 Transition" status report each month in our News Digest section.

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