6 replies to this topic

[CMHeywood]

Which department, which person or people, and what procedure (including frequency and reporting) should be listed.  In other words, which job title has the function of doing calibration?  It may be different people depending on the equipment that is calibrated.  Example:  Maintenance is responsible for calibrating thermometers on production equipment.

[Redangel]

Hi Charles.C and CMHeywood,

 

I work in a food manufacturing company and we have equipment that requires calibration like raw materials intake weighers, truck scale, check weighers for FGs. The current set up is that QA/laboratory personnel schedules the calibration (3rd party) of all laboratory equipment while calibration scheduling for all other equipment is done by the Plant Engineering. Is this a wrong set up or should it be QA that should be in-charge of all calibration schedules?

[Charles.C]

Hi Charles.C and CMHeywood,

 

I work in a food manufacturing company and we have equipment that requires calibration like raw materials intake weighers, truck scale, check weighers for FGs. The current set up is that QA/laboratory personnel schedules the calibration (3rd party) of all laboratory equipment while calibration scheduling for all other equipment is done by the Plant Engineering. Is this a wrong set up or should it be QA that should be in-charge of all calibration schedules?

 

Hi redangel,

 

(1) I daresay there may be a good reason why the demarcation you refer exists ? Specific Equipment Knowlege/Capabilities perhaps ?

 

IMEX Engineering personnel are usually only too delighted to unload functions like calibration of weighing units onto QA while they focus on more "important" activities..

 

(2) I deduce the equipment is not related to any HACCP type activities, eg CCP monitoring.

 

(3) The situation might be more complicated if some of the equipment overlaps into yr audited FS system but if yr auditor is happy ............

[Redangel]

Hi Charles.C,

 

Thank you for your comments...we do not have a HACCP-related equipment that requires calibration but there are GMP-related equipment like vitamin feeders, checkweighers, top loading balances and magnets which are being used by production dept. Should QA be in-charge of the calibration for these?

 

How about the pressure gages and flowmeters used also by production...and grain intake weighers and truck scale? 

 

Best regards,

Redangel

[Charles.C]

Hi Charles.C,

 

Thank you for your comments...we do not have a HACCP-related equipment that requires calibration but there are GMP-related equipment like vitamin feeders, checkweighers, top loading balances and magnets which are being used by production dept. Should QA be in-charge of the calibration for these?

 

How about the pressure gages and flowmeters used also by production...and grain intake weighers and truck scale? 

 

Best regards,

Redangel

 

Hi Redangel,

 

What kind of food manufacturing is involved ?

 

Could you respond to Queries (1,3) in Post 3 ?

 

A generic answer could be that the "Section" responsible for the correct operation of the Equipment has the overall responsibility to maintain its Calibration. But "they" would be entitled to delegate such responsibility if deemed appropriate by "Management".

 

Some Companies might equally stipulate that Calibration of certain equipment be done by a 3rd party.

 

The possibilities are IMO boundless.

[Redangel]

Hello Charles.C,

It's a flour milling...We are reviewing our procedure on calibration and there is an inclination to give overall responsibility of calibration (all those mentioned above) to QA dept.

However, QA believes that Engineering and Production should be responsible for calibration of equipment because they know more about their equipment and can monitor on how it performs on a day to day basis. Btw, All calibrations are done by 3rd party.

 

(1) I daresay there may be a good reason why the demarcation you refer exists ? Specific Equipment Knowlege/Capabilities perhaps ?

Currently, Engineering handles all calibration of intake weighers, truckscales, standard weights, checkweighers....QA handles those in the  laboratory. Production is responsible their top loading balances and magnets. Is it best this way ...?

 

(3) The situation might be more complicated if some of the equipment overlaps into yr audited FS system but if yr auditor is happy.

Top loading balances, checkweighers, std. weights and lab. equipment are covered by FS audit. It would seem a conflict of interest if the auditor and scheduler of calibration is from QA.

 

[Charles.C]

Hi Redangel,

 

It seems to me that  today, much of the Calibration-related activity is driven by the ever-expanding demands of FS Systems, in my case BRC.

 

And, i think most FS Systems, especially the Documentation part, are happily loaded onto the QA Plate  since, from a Top Management POV,  this section is often regarded as an unavoidable financial liability. Other non-profit making activities such as Calibration and Documentation then come with the FS System..

 

BRC  also include many non-Safety related activities, eg weight control, so their calibration unavoidably gravitates to QA also.

 

Further, some equipment, eg metal detectors, cookers, are in the FS / haccp Plan and also become QA controlled activities / Calibration.

 

So IMEX a lot of the Calibration allocations derive from the boom in FS / GFSI requirements, If the latter is absent, more logical job-related allocations  may loccur such as you itemise.

 

As you say, the IA function can be a problem but this aspect is usually regarded as a case of finding a work-around  by Top Management.