UWC freight car builders among first in Russia to comply with ISO/TS 22163
Tikhvin Freight Car Building Plant and TikhvinChemMash, both parts of the railway holding United Wagon Company (UWC), have been certified compliant with ISO/TS 22163:2017, which is the new international standard for quality management systems in the railway industry. The UWC companies were among the first Russian transport engineering companies to be certified under the new standard.
New standard SO/TS 22163:2017 – Railway Applications. Quality Management System. Business management systems requirements for railway organizations - replaces the International Railway Industry Standard (IRIS), which was developed earlier on the initiative of the Association of the European Railway Industry (Union des Industries Ferroviaires Européennes, UNIFE) using the ISO 9000 series of standards as a basis.
ISO/TS 22163:2017, also developed by UNIFE, is based on ISO 9001:2015, supplemented by special requirements for the railway industry regarding the design, manufacture, repair and maintenance of rolling stock and components, signalling systems and railway infrastructure units. The standard came into effect in June 2017 and companies must comply with the requirements of the new standard by September of next year. Russian Railways, which is the owner of railway infrastructure in Russia, has made compliance with ISO/TS 22163:2017 obligatory for its suppliers and sub-suppliers as part of its strategic quality management policy.
Mikhail Zalunaev, Head of the Russian branch of the certification authority DQS, commented:
“The new standard is designed to help railway companies improve the quality of their services and products by implementing advanced work practices and production processes. Compliance with the standard shows a high level of achievement by an enterprise, proving that it has the latest technology in place and takes account of all aspects related to safety. The fact that manufacturing enterprises of UWC are again among the first to successfully undergo certification and verification of compliance with industry standards shows that their business management systems are highly effective.”
Oleg Senkovsky, Vice President and Member of the Supervisory Board of the Union of Industries of Railway Equipment, said:
“Wide dissemination and intensive use of the new standard will help improve the quality of services and products throughout the railway industry. Rapid transition of the Tikhvin plants to the new version of the industry standard shows that Russia has world-class companies with quality management systems that meet the latest standardization requirements.”