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Internal Audit Plan, Program and schedule

Discussion in 'ISO 9001:2015 - Quality Management Systems' started by Dobis, Aug 20, 2019.

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Is there any difference between internal audit plan, program and schedule. Thanks

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  1. Dobis

    Dobis Member

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    Is there any difference between internal audit plan, program and schedule. Thanks
     
  2. Andy Nichols

    Andy Nichols Moderator Staff Member

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    Yes, a BIG difference. The caveat is that when considering types of audits, 1st, 2nd and 3rd party, terminology is often not common across all three.

    Most of this is cleared up in the glossary of ISO 19011 (for internal audits), however:

    • An audit program is one or more audits

    • An audit plan is a specific approach to an audit that an auditor may take - this will be a typical "what" and "when" and auditor uses to advise the auditee:
    example:
    8.00am - Opening Meeting
    8.10am - Sales Process Audit - RFQ, Sales Order Processing, Change Orders
    9.00am - Customer Feedback etc

    • An audit schedule isn't mentioned in ISO 19011 since it's usually part of the plan.

    Typically, people schedule their internal audits to a calendar - which isn't and never has been a requirement (hence it's not in ISO 19011). Such a schedule is derived (often by 3rd Party auditors) from a misunderstanding of the "frequency" requirements of 9.2.2.

    The "timing" of audits is going to depend on many things and doesn't have to be planned out to some arbitrary (monthly) calendar making it a practical impossibility to do and have meaningful audits without making constant changes to the schedule, which means the schedule was rubbish in the first place.
     
    Last edited: Aug 20, 2019
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  3. tony s

    tony s Well-Known Member

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    In the hierarchy of documented information related to audit, I believe, below should be the arrangement:
    • Audit programme - arrangements for a set of one or more audits planned for a specific time frame and directed towards a specific purpose (3.4 of ISO 19011:2018);
    • Audit plan - description of the activities and arrangements for an audit (3.6 of ISO 19011:2018);
    • Audit schedule - ISO 19011 is silent on this. But mentioned this in section 5.5.7 "Records related to the audit programme, such as - schedule of audits..."
    So you can use the regular definition of a "schedule" such as the timetable for the audit activities. Andy is right. The schedule is just part of the audit plan.
     
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  4. Dobis

    Dobis Member

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    Thanks.