The foundations for effective quality assurance measures have been continuously laid since 1986.

MATTES & AMMANN is, as ever, impatient.

By our standards, too much time passed between the accreditation follow-up work and presentation of the certificate.

But now we finally have it!

LABORATORY MANAGEMENT

Ladies and gentlemen,

after the implementation of management systems and sets of rules in the organisation of MATTES & AMMANN (which were never seen as a „burden“, rather, much more as a path to perfection), we decided to undertake a new „project“ in the closing of 2014. Said project was the accreditation of our laboratory. Quality is and remains the main competitive factor for every commercial success. Consistently high quality of performance and customer satisfaction are ensured long-term through strategic quality management such as DIN EN ISO/IEC 17025 for testing labs.

What’s important in the accreditation of a lab is the traceability of the measurement results which are essential in terms of quality or in the case of possible liability claims.

An increase in transparency will also gain importance in the future and leads to an increase in the value of the lab, internally and externally. The reasons for an accreditation, aside from competitive advantages and an increase in value, can be different for each laboratory. In our case, the reasons were primarily:

• the attestation of professional and technical competence through DAkkS (Deutsche Akkreditierungsstelle GmbH, Berlin),
• additional assurance of consistently high quality of performance and customer satisfaction,
• international acceptance and recognition.

An elementary point on the path to accreditation was the autonomy and independence of the laboratory. This was achieved directly and the lab now carries its own name:

ZENTRALLABOR M&A
(M&A Central Laboratory)

Through the accreditation of the lab, the professional and technical competence regarding

testing procedure was certified by a public body (DAkkS). In this process, the expertise and analytical knowledge of the staff are main components of a functioning quality management system. In order to create accreditable conditions for the implementation of a QM system in accordance with ISO/ IEC 17025 in the lab, the main work included, aside from the creation of the required documentation, the following:

• training of the staff
• determination of responsibility/ competence (organisation chart)
• restriction of lab access to lab staff only
• validation of testing procedure and partial validation of software
• registration and labelling of reference materials
• creation of IT concept (data protection and security). Among other things, we implemented a laboratory information management system (LIMS).
• expansion of the quality assurance measures already in place in the lab, including utilisation of control limits
• determination of measurement and result uncertainties for all accredited testing methods
• regular supplier evaluations (yearly)
• development of a programme for participation in ring trials
• information, involvement and integration of the staff.

After the main points had been elaborated, the complete application procedure with DakkS ensued, whereby our procedure number and lab number were assigned. On 11-12 February 2016, we achieved the first accreditation in accordance with ISO/IEC 17025, and then the big moment finally came:

We received the CERTIFICATE
on 18 July 2016.

The entire team was absolutely delighted and could now hold the official result of our work in their hands!!!

30 June 2017, Michael Bermes
Lab manager / Quality Management Officer