BS test for haulage?
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• Hauliers of the future can look forward to regular visits from British Standards inspectors in order to keep their names on the list of "quality assured" transport companies, predicts ICI's distribution manager, Zander McQuillan.
Speaking last week at a meeting of the Road Haulage Association's International Group on 'Looking towards the year 2000' McQuillan reported that "Quality assessment will be the key to staying in business then, and we will all be going along the Japanese lines of 'getting it right first time'."
"We will have to guarantee that our production process, our management systems, record keeping, after sales service, maintenance and training schemes meet that standard," asserts McQuillan. "The whole operation must be quality assured, and this will ultimately filter down to the transport firms we use to move our products."
While the idea of quality standards is very much at an
embryonic stage within the haulage industry, many manufacturing companies in the UK are currently registered under BS 5750. This covers not only adminstration and production of materials, but also business systems and training. They receive inspections three or four times a year to ensure high standards are maintained.
On March 26 the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) launches its quality code for commercial vehicle body builders under the same British Standard. The quality assured certificate, once gained by a body builder, will promise his customer that the product he is buying is reliable, durable and built to a minimum standard of bodywork engineering.
Prestons of Potto, operators in the north-east, is already looking towards a time when customers will demand hauliers have this standard. "At the moment we are monitoring our own performances to customers," says Anne Preston.