06. Jun 2017

News from the world of quality management in the railway-business

Since 24.05.2017 the ISO/TS 22163 as successor of IRIS Rev. 2.1 is published. On the 1st of June 2017 the new IRIS Certification^TM rules 2017 for certification has been published.

Please note – only quality management systems certified according IRIS Rev. 03 will be accepted within the railway-business.

The publication of ISO/TS 22163 builds the cornerstone for the creation of a “full” ISO –standard. Additionally the “ISO/TS – approach causes the need for specific IRIS-certification rules. The ISO/TS 22163 is available at all organisations selling standards, currently in English and French language. Other languages are under development. The following figure – published by the IRIS management center – is showing the interaction of the three main pillars for the IRIS rev 03 certification:

ISO/TS 22163 – the standard which contains additionally to ISO 9001:2015 several railway-business specific requirements
Rules for IRIS rev 03 certification
Tools for auditing, search for certified companies and data-maintenance

What are the benefits that companies – cerified according IRIS CertificationTM rev. 03 – can expect in detail?

reducing failures and thereby this will reduce or avoid expensive field-repairs
audits will be provided based on a clear and traceable maturity matrix, which helps to identfiy organizational development potentials
analysing the deployment and reached results of critical processes. Depending on the scope of business ISO/TS 22163 defines five critical processes:
- Requirements for product and services
- Project management
- Control of externally provided processes, products and services (EPPPS)
- Design and development of product and services
- Production and service provision
Clear visibility of the maturity level of ISO/TS 22163 certified organizations
- Each certified organization will get in addition to the existing certificate a separate certificate indicating the performance level of the organization (bronze / silver / gold) on a yearly basis
- The certification-level will correspond with the quality performance -> a clear promise for product quality
- This performance level will be shown at the IRIS-certification database and thus can for instance be used as marketing instrument
- The bronze, silver or gold status is calculated and based on a mix of several components:
  - Customer orientation
  - Process performance level (of the critical processes)
  - Overall maturity level based on the result in the audit-tool
Some railway-providers like RZD have already decided to buy only from companies which are IRIS-certified. Contracts and letters of intend from other providers like “Deutsche Bahn” (German railway) are available too.
There will be a change in the certification-procedure:
- Companies to be certified shall send information about customer perception and performance figures of critical processes at least 60 day’s prior to the certification audit to the lead-auditor
- Based on these data, auditors shall be well prepared fort he process performance evaluation on site
- Topics oft he surveillance –audits will be highly customized on core-topics
IRIS CertificationTM rev. 03 certified companies can also get an ISO 9001:2015 certificate additionally to the IRIS certificate – without any further audit

What are the benefits for the customers of the IRIS CertificationTM rev. 03 certified companies?

The aim is to ensure that the complex issue of railway vehicle production, in which from the order acquisition until the end of the maintenance / spare parts obligation 30 - 50 years are needed, is to be secured in that way, that both the product quality and the project quality in terms of

safety,
on time delivery,
costs and
function

can be fulfilled.
One major pillar of the IRIS CertificationTM rev. 03 is customer orientation. For this purpose, specific audit questions, which deal with the customer's perception, are given special attention. The maturity-level of these questions is included in the assessment of quality levels and thus in the annual supplementary certificate "gold - silver - bronze".

News from the world of quality management in the railway-business

If you develop, produce or maintain parts or even complete railways the following content will be of great interest for you. If you are an railway-operator – you shouldn’t miss the following content.

Based on the ISO/TS 22163:2017 combined with the IRIS CertificationTM rev. 03 system both, certified companies as well as the customers of these companies should and will gain several benefits.

The benefits in a nutshell:

Transparent maturity level-rating of the (quality-)management system - Systematic process performance rating of critical processes
Differentiation by means of an additional quality performance certificate in bronze – silver or gold - issued annually
Complete integration of ISO 9001:2015
Focus on customer orientation and customer related performance
Customized surveillance audits

Outlook

As it is with ISO 9001:2015 or ISO 14001:2015 all existing certificiates will expire on 15.9.2018. Therefore the IRIS-certificates have to be transformed to the new certification scheme “IRIS CertificationTM rev. 03”. Since June 1st 2017 all necessary rules are ready to be used. Please note, that beginning with June 2018 only IRIS CertificationTM rev. 03 are possible –till then, the company to be certified can choose between the existing IRIS Rev 02 (based on ISO 9001:2008) or the new IRIS CertificationTM rev. 03 (based on ISO 9001:2015).

The qualityaustria auditteam is well prepared for both system-certifications. We are very pleased about Kirill Dubkov, our new IRIS-auditor in Russia.

Due to the brand new release of the certification rules and the standard, the training-documents are currently under development. Customized trainings for newcomers as well as for those in the transition-phase will be available in autumn 2017.

If you are interested, please contact Mr. Johann Vesely or Mr. Wolfgang Pölz.