SUPPLIER QUALITY

What a purchase order must carry: flowing down AS9100D 8.4.3

A supplier can only meet the requirements it receives. Drawings and specifications usually reach the supplier. Special-process approvals, key characteristic data, change notification, counterfeit prevention and right of access often do not. When something goes wrong, the gap is rarely in the supplier's capability. It is in what the purchase order never said.

Approval decides who; flow-down decides what

AS9100D 8.4 splits external-provider control into three questions. 8.4.1 decides who you may buy from and how approval is maintained. 8.4.2 decides how deeply you verify what you receive. 8.4.3 decides what information the supplier must receive before the work starts.

Approval and verification are covered in Why an approved supplier list does not eliminate purchasing risk. This guide covers the third question. 8.4.3 also asks the organization to make sure requirements are adequate before it communicates them.

Turn each item into a clause

A practical method is to write each applicable 8.4.3 item as a numbered purchasing quality clause, then tick the clauses that apply on each order. The table below is an excerpt from a fictional company, ABC Aerospace.

8.4.3	Requirement flowed down	Example purchasing quality clause
a	Product and technical data: specifications, drawings, process requirements, work instructions	Q01: Manufacture to the drawing number, revision and specifications listed on this order
b	Approval of products, methods and equipment, and release	Q02: Special processes must use methods and equipment approved by us
c	Competence and qualification of persons	Q03: Special-process and NDT personnel must hold the qualifications the specification requires
g	Design and development control	Not ticked when outsourced work includes no design
h	Special requirements, critical items and key characteristics	Q05: Provide actual measured data for every key characteristic marked on the drawing
i	Test, inspection and verification, including production process verification	Q06: Provide a first article inspection report for new part numbers and the first lot after a change
k	QMS, designated sources, nonconformity notification, counterfeit prevention, change notification and approval, flow-down to sub-tier, test specimens, record retention	Q07–Q12, one clause each. Q10: notify us and obtain approval before changing process, location or sub-tier supplier
l	Right of access for the organization, its customer and regulatory authorities	Q13: Allow us, our customer and regulatory authorities access to applicable areas and records
m	Awareness of contribution to product conformity, product safety and ethical behaviour	Q14: Ensure your personnel are aware of all three

Two details make this work. Each clause has a number, so a purchase order can cite it. Each order shows which clauses were ticked, so an auditor can check a single order against the risk of the item bought.

Flow-down does not stop at your supplier

Item k includes flowing applicable requirements down to the supplier's own sub-tier providers. 8.4.1 also expects you to require suppliers to control their direct and sub-tier providers. A clause that reaches your heat-treat supplier but not the furnace calibration lab it relies on leaves the chain open.

A synthetic example: one change notice

This dialogue is fictional and simplified.

Auditor: Over the past year, has any supplier notified you of a change on its own initiative?

Buyer: Yes. In March our heat-treat supplier told us it would replace a vacuum furnace. Clause Q10 required them to request approval first.

Auditor: What did you do with it?

Quality manager: We required equipment approval for the new furnace and an extra distortion check after finish machining on the first lot. Until approval, our parts ran only in the old furnace.

The supplier would have changed the furnace either way. The difference is that the purchase order made the change visible, and someone acted on it.

Questions an auditor may ask

Which 8.4.3 items do your purchasing quality clauses cover? How are the missing ones communicated?
On this purchase order, which clauses were ticked, and why do they fit this item's risk?
When did a supplier last notify you of a change? If the answer is "never," it is usually not because nothing changed.
How do you know your supplier flows the same requirements to its sub-tier providers?

Approved supplier ≠ informed supplier

AS9100D makes the organization responsible for everything it buys, including from customer-designated sources. That responsibility is only workable when the requirements travel with the order.

About this guide

This article is adapted from a chapter of AS9100D in Practice: From Requirements to Objective Evidence. It refers to AS9100D by clause number and does not reproduce its text. The clause table is an excerpt, not a complete list of 8.4.3. It is not an official interpretation and does not replace the standard, customer requirements or your own procedures. Not affiliated with or endorsed by SAE, IAQG or ISO. Companies and events in the example are fictional.

FROM KNOWLEDGE TO PRACTICE

Read the full chapter: AS9100D in Practice covers 8.4.1 to 8.4.3 together, with risk-based verification, a supplier status rule table and procedure wording.

Check your evidence: AS9100D Internal Audit & Objective Evidence Master Toolkit

Read the full chapter Check your evidence

AS9100D in Practice is published in Traditional Chinese.