Do you want to make sure your suppliers are reliable and capable before integrating them into your supply chain? Factory audit service are one of the best ways to get a complete picture of your supplier’s sourcing and operational policies and ensure that they align with your company’s brand image.
The type of factory audit service that’s best for your company depends on the type of product or service you provide.
In this article, you will learn about the most common types of audits and their benefits to determine the most suitable factory audit service for your organization.
Manufacturing Audits
During a manufacturing process audit, the auditors determine if a supplier is capable of:
- Producing a product that meets your company’s specifications.
- Addressing costly disruptions.
- Preventing (further) costly disorders once production is launched.
Benefits of a Manufacturing Audit
- Verifies that your supplier’s manufacturing facilities are suitable to produce your product
- Ensures alignment of your company’s sourcing policies and your supplier’s policies
- Identifies and mitigates potential quality, operational, and ethical risks
- Evaluates the competence of factory management
Ethical Audits
Ethical audits help to ensure social accountability is being reviewed. With increasing pressure for all companies to be socially accountable – to provide healthy, safe, and honest work environments along with sound labor practices and pay – an ethical audit ensure the appropriate work conditions are followed. The criteria used for ethical factory audits can be client-specific and based on several international standards.
Benefits of Ethical Audits
- Ensures your supply chain has decent working conditions and human rights practices
- Helps determine compliance with statutory requirements
- Prevents unauthorized subcontracting
- It helps gain an accurate understanding of ethical compliance
- Builds cooperative relations with suppliers
- Improves your company’s brand image and consumer loyalty
Structural Audits
Structural audits are designed to analyze the integrity and safety of your suppliers’ buildings and premises. This includes auditing the structural integrity, fire safety measures, relevant codes, and conditions.
Benefits of Structural Audits
- Ensures safe working conditions, which helps prevent minor and catastrophic injury
- Ensures that employee health is not in danger
- Protects your brand image and reputation
- Reviews compliance with statutory requirements
- It helps gain an accurate understanding of the state of safety in your supply chain
- It prevents supply chain interruptions
Environmental Audits
By monitoring and improving the environmental impact of your supply chain, environmental factory audits help evaluate compliance with local laws and regulations as it relates to environmental protection.
Benefits of Environmental Audits
- Assurances that international principles and your company’s compliance requirements are both being followed
- Provides the ability to combine audit results with lab testing to capture a complete picture of your supplier’s environmental performance
- Leads to the improvement of environmental performance
- Verifies compliances with local and international regulations for environmental protection.
The factory audit service, each type, all lead to the ultimate goal of protecting your company’s image and your brand image.
They allow an independent third-party auditor to objectively evaluate core objectives of safety, security, ethical operations, compliance with government regulations, adherence to your company’s standards, and avoiding costly supply chain interruptions.
