Need Help Understanding ISO 9001:2008 Outsourcing Requirements for Cargo Handling

Dear Sir,

Please help me out by providing guidance related to the Outsourcing clause in ISO 9001. Our company is certified with ISO 9001:2000 and is soon going to be upgraded under the ambit of 9001:2008 after the re-certification process. The certification agency has informed us to update our manuals as per the requirements of the 9001:2008 norms. Our company deals with cargo handling, and we outsource vehicle hiring. For this purpose, I require guidance on the scope of outsourcing and what should be included in the Quality Manual for the outsourcing process. If anyone can upload the same, it would be a great help to me.

Thanks a lot.

Understanding Outsourcing in Your Organization

If any part of your organization's processes is being done by anybody else outside the organization, it comes under outsourcing. However, it is necessary to control outsourced processes if they affect the product/service conformity requirements. The question now is, what should be the limit of controlling it for the organization?

Contracts and Legal Requirements

In your case, contracts with a transport company and timely renewals, labor contracts, licenses to run the transport company, legal requirements, etc., are essential considerations.

Transportation

Depending on customer requirements or contract specifications, goods cleared from customers are delivered to the customers by arranging transport. Sometimes, transportation is arranged by the customers, and goods are collected by them from the warehouse.

Understanding Outsourcing in ISO 9001:2000

The term “outsourcing” has been discussed at length since the publication of ISO 9001:2000. In fact, it spurred guidance documents as well as articles to explain its use in subclause 4.1, as well as its relation to the purchasing process in subclause 7.4.1. In an attempt to clarify the intent, notes were added to subclause 4.1 that require the organization to identify processes to be completed by an external party and the factors influencing the nature and extent of control over these processes. The added text is in the form of notes, thereby serving to provide clarification—not additional requirements.

In reviewing the new note that clarifies the relationship of outsourcing to the organization's purchasing process, it's important to remember that this is just one of the methods that can be used to control the process. If the organization outsources a process to another party, such as a corporate headquarters, the purchasing process would not necessarily be sufficient to control the QMS implications of that process, so other methods would need to be established. Therefore, organizations need to analyze each process separately to determine the necessary controls.