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APPENDIX IV
QUALITY SYSTEMS
TERMINOLOGY

The following terms and definitions are selected from those given in the American National Standard
ANSI/ASQC A8402-1994, Quality Management and Quality Assurance—Vocabulary. The reader is
urged to consult the full standard for the full vocabulary list and for valuable notes and comments
associated with individual terms. The document is available from American Society for Quality, 611
East Wisconsin Avenue, Milwaukee, WI 53202. In many cases, the authors of specific sections have
used slightly different or expanded definitions of some terms. The following terms and definitions
are provided for general understanding and use.
Conformity: Fulfillment of specific requirements.
Customer: Recipient of a product provided by the supplier.
Dependability: Collective term used to describe the availability performance and its influ-
encing factors: reliability performance, maintainability performance, and maintenance-support
performance.
Design review: Documented, comprehensive, and systematic examination of a design to evalu-
ate its capability to fulfill the requirements for quality, identify problems, if any, and propose the
development of solutions.
Deviation permit: See Production permit.
Entity: Item which can be individually described and considered.
Grade: Category or rank given to entities having the same functional use but different require-
ments for quality.
Inspection: Activity such as measuring, examining, testing, or gauging one or more character-
istics of an entity and comparing the results with specified requirements in order to establish
whether conformity is achieved for each characteristic.
Objective evidence: Information which can be proved true, based on facts obtained through
observation, measurement, test, or other means.
Procedure: Specified way to perform an activity.
Process: Set of interrelated resources and activities which transform inputs into outputs.
Process quality audit: See Quality audit.
Product: Results of activities or processes.
Product quality audit: See Quality audit.
Production permit (Deviation permit): Written authorization to depart from the originally spec-
ified requirements for a product prior to its production.
Quality: Totality of characteristics of an entity that bear on its ability to satisfy stated and
implied needs.
Quality assurance: All the planned and systematic activities implemented within the quality
system, and demonstrated as needed, to provide adequate confidence that an entity will fulfill
requirements for quality.
Quality audit: Systematic and independent examination to determine whether quality activities
and related results comply with planned arrangements and whether these arrangements are imple-

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AIV.2 APPENDIX IV

mented effectively and are suitable to achieve objectives. Note: The quality audit typically applies
to, but is not limited to, a quality system or elements thereof, to processes, to products, and to ser-
vices. Such audits are often called “quality system audit,” “process quality audit,” product quality
audit,” “service quality audit.”
Quality control: Operational techniques and activities that are used to fulfill requirements for
quality.
Quality loop/quality spiral: Conceptual model of interacting activities that influence quality as
well as the losses incurred when satisfactory quality is not achieved.
Quality management: All activities of the overall management function that determine the
quality policy, objectives, and responsibilities, and implement them by means such as quality
planning, quality control, and quality improvement within the quality system.
Quality plan: Document setting out the specific quality practices, resources, and sequence of
activities relevant to a particular product, project, or contract.
Quality planning: Activities that establish the objectives and requirements for quality and for
the application of quality system elements.
Quality policy: Overall intentions and direction of an organization with regard to quality, as
formally expressed by top management.
Quality surveillance: Continual monitoring and verification of the status of an entity and analysis
of records to ensure that specified requirements are being fulfilled.
Quality system: Organizational structure, procedures, processes, and resources needed to
implement quality management.
Quality system audit: See Quality audit.
Requirements for quality: Expression of the needs or their translation into a set of quantitatively
or qualitatively stated requirements for the characteristics of an entity to enable its realization and
examination.
Requirements of society: Obligations resulting from laws, regulations, rules, codes, statutes,
and other considerations.
Service: Result generated by activities at the interface between the supplier and the customer
and by supplier internal activities to meet the customer needs.
Specification: Document stating requirements.
Supplier: Organization that provides a product to the customer.
Traceability: Ability to trace the history, application, or location of an entity by means of
recorded identifications.
Verification: Confirmation by examination and provision of objective evidence that specified
requirements have been fulfilled.
Waiver: Written authorization to use or release a product which does not conform to the specified
requirements.