Internal audits are an essential part of achieving and maintaining any ISO certification. We’ve compiled our top 3 tips to prepare for your internal audit:
1) You don’t need a written procedure
ISO 9001 quality certification and ISO 14001 environment certification specify that you don’t need to have a written procedure for your internal audit; this requirement was amended during the 2015 revisions of both standards.
You just need to be able to demonstrate to your auditor that you have a process in place, that you are conducting audits and that you plan for those audits. The standard does directly require a program, this demonstrates that you’ve thought about and pre-planned your internal audits accordingly. How you present or organise this information is entirely up to your business, but it must be able to be demonstrated to your auditor.
2) Think about where you’ve had issues in the past
The next thing to think about is the issues you’ve had in the past. If you’ve had non-conformances, customer complaints or significant issues related to projects in the past, these areas are an ideal place to start thinking about and planning for when undertaking your internal audits. Checking on these areas is advisable, for example, if you’ve had an IT-related issue in the past this can be amended by doing an internal audit around your security protocols. If your business has received a customer complaint about your invoices, your internal audit could include a comprehensive check of your invoicing procedures.
3) Consider your Critical Control Points (CCP)
The next step is to think about the CCP or the critical steps in your processes. CCP is not just a food safety concept, it’s applicable to any business; whether you’re a service provider or a product manufacturer or wholesaler there will be critical steps in your processes, and these are the ideal place to focus upon in your internal audit. For example, it might be that you’re manufacturing products and have a final key step in that process where you’re heating or testing your final product. It is essential that this step is completed correctly and is a good choice for focusing your internal audit on.
If you haven’t already and think you are ready for certification contact us now and request a quick quote including answers to all your questions regarding certification.
