What is Quality Assurance?

Quality Assurance means that you have a system to consistently deliver products and services to a high standard; the standard expected by your customers.

It is achieved by implementing a quality management system that identifies what an organisation needs to do to guarantee the Quality of the “thing” (product and/or service) that their customers pay for.

What is the difference between Quality Assurance, Quality Management & Quality Control?

Quality control is retrospective – a final check or lagging indicator of performance. It doesn’t take into account the whole quality management system framework.

Quality Management relates to the wholistic quality management system that has been established to ensure process performance.

When you have implemented a QMS, and achieved certification to ISO 9001 or certification to some other quality standard you are deemed to be a Quality Assured company.

Quality Assurance Explained

One of the simplest ways to explain Quality Assurance is with the analogy of a Big Mac. If you walk into any McDonalds around the world you can pretty much guarantee that your Big Mac will look and taste the same – Maccas has implemented a system to control the quality of the Big Mac, and there is more to the system than you might imagine. Consider the following aspects of delivering the same Big Mac across 119 different countries:

• Staff training,
• Production equipment,
• Ingredients (including suppliers, recipes, stock rotation etc)
• Burger cooking and assembly procedures (eg temperatures, paddy cook times, sequence, how much special sauce is used),
• Packaging,
• Feedback (complaints and compliments) Systems to make sure that any Non-conforming burgers are identified and addressed.

Quality Assurance Audits

A management system may also be audited in different ways including:

• First-party/ Self Audit: Members of the organisation audit themselves or engage an ISO Consultant to conduct audit activities
• Second-party / Customer Audit: The organisation is audited by a customer or related organisation
• Third-party / Independent Audit: A member of a JAS-ANZ accredited Certification Body conducts an independent third-party assessment of the management system and the ability of the organisation to deliver Quality Assurance. This audit is required for companies to become ISO 9001 certified.

 Contact Us Today

If you’d like more information, or to request a Quick Quote please use the form to the right and one of our ISO Consultants will contact you within one business day. Alternatively, you are welcome to contact us directly by emailing [email protected] or by calling:

• Brisbane 07 3667 8280
• Sydney 02 8315 7780
• Melbourne 03 9034 3990

We look forward to hearing from you and answering any questions you may have.

External link: for more information on ISO 9001:2015 Quality Management System Requirements CLICK HERE