​ISO 9001 update: Inside the latest meeting of Technical Committee 176

As a holder of Category A liaison status with ISO Technical Committee 176 (ISO TC176), the CQI has the ability to be involved in, and influence, the new ISO 9001 standard – due to be published later this year.

The ISO TC176 meeting took place in Vilnius, Lithuania, and was hosted by the Russian Register. Colin MacNee, secretary and UK delegate at ISO/TC176/SC2/WG24, and I attended the event to represent the CQI and its members.

It was the final meeting to disposition all the comments made on the ISO 9001:2015 Draft International Standard (DIS) in preparation for the Final Draft International Standard (FDIS). It was a meticulous process that involved reviewing every comment with members of the group and then coming to a unanimous decision whether to accept it in full, in part, not accept, or to mark it as comment/noted. CQI members submitted more than 200 comments.

We are unable to provide responses to every member who submitted comments but I can confirm that a significant number were accepted in part or fully, with very few not accepted. Comments made by CQI members were replicated within the final comments document, reviewed by the working group. It showed we’re aligned with many other quality professionals and national standard bodies within TC176/WG24.

We worked tirelessly to ensure we completed the task and promoted the CQI as a key player in the primary international quality standard. If you contributed, I would like to thank you for your time and effort. This meeting was a great success for the CQI.