Want to save days, weeks or even months of work? You can now get all this information sent to you in Microsoft Word format by purchasing our Quality Management System In A Box.

Corrective and preventive actions are listed separately in the standard to drive home the point that you can not have successful company that only corrects problems, you must prevent problems.

Corrective and preventive actions also go hand-in-hand with the requirement for continuous improvement. If the company is analyzing their mistakes, anticipating future mistakes and continuously improving, The quality of the product and services at the company will eventually be GREAT. The corrective and preventive actions system is the most critical element for an efficient quality system. Corrective and preventive actions are made using Engineering Change Requests (ECR) and Engineering Change Orders (ECO).

Any quality problem or suggestion should generate an ECR. This is the queue for engineering. If the engineering/quality manager decides that an action is required, then an ECO is created and assigned to someone with the resources to correct and prevent future problems.

ECOs should be generated by negative customer feedback, negative trend in product performance, observed areas for improvement, upgrades to documentation, or any other continuous improvement activities. Engineering change orders are the life blood of the organization and they must always be flowing to keep the organization strong and growing.

With this in mind, it is critical that the engineering change order system quick, simple and effective. I highly recommend the use of a database for managing ECRs and ECOs. This will give you a searchable history of changes to your products and is the best tool for continuous improvement.

I also recommend the use of ECO classes. Each class has level of approval based on the magnitude of the change. Simple changes require a minimal effort and approval.

Here is a Sample Engineering Change Procedure that can be used in as part of the corrective and preventive actions system