Toyota Audits Suppliers And Finds Quality Shortcomings

Toyota Motor Corp. set out to audit suppliers in North America following its biggest recall crisis and discovered testing of components wasn’t as rigorous as it expected.

Toyota is a third of the way through audits of suppliers of “the highest priority” parts, and some suppliers believed to be testing products four times a year were only doing so once a year, Dino Triantafyllos, vice president of North American product quality, said yesterday.

“We have found areas where maybe there was a misunderstanding about some aspects of the process,” said Triantafyllos, who attended a global quality meeting today at the carmaker’s Toyota City headquarters.




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Joe_Limon - 10/14/2010 1:08:04 PM

0 Boost

I'm shocked that Toyota would even accept faulty product in the first place.

After having worked in a machine shop, whenever something isn't made up to the drawing standards if it isn't caught by the shop qc department it sure is caught by the company who paid for it.

Agent009 - 10/14/2010 2:02:55 PM

+4 Boost

The sheer volume might not allow that to happen.

However it is a case where the suppliers were self governing the QC process without an accountability system in place. They simply saved the money on testing and placed it in their pocket.

Joe_Limon - 10/14/2010 2:24:40 PM

+1 Boost

You don't need to check every single part for such quantities, a simple random sample will tell you if the supplier is exceeding your allowable reject rates. I highly doubt Toyota has a zero reject tolerance level. If they did, they would be stupid for blindly accepting parts without checking them. And they would be paying through the nose.

Agent009 - 10/14/2010 3:57:17 PM

+2 Boost

It appear Toyota thought they part supplier was doing the testing, and the part supplier thought that Toyota would tell them if there was an issue.

uaw_lax - 10/14/2010 6:06:45 PM

0 Boost

You get what you pay for. Toyota has squeezes the suppliers for every penny for the sake of making a profit.

quizz - 10/14/2010 10:52:35 PM

0 Boost

all for profit, and Toyota did have record profits in the mid-2000's

cohwang - 10/15/2010 1:01:31 AM

0 Boost

Whatever reasons both Toyota and the supplier have to defend their problems, it is good for us to think why this problem only happened in the States, not in Japan and Europe. In terms of market shares, Toyota is the biggest player in the asian countries, except China. Toyota has little market in Europe which could result in better QC and management.

The big 3 have massive recalls annually. It is almost the routine practice for the companies to recall millions of vehicles every year. Big 3 do have the problem and so does Toyota. Why!!

deepwater - 10/15/2010 2:26:11 AM

+2 Boost

Replace all US supplier to japanese. This is the only quality credit for Toyota.

internationalmanofmystery - 10/15/2010 9:40:26 AM

0 Boost

Oh, what a tangled web we weave when first we practiced to deceive our...... base

truckman - 10/16/2010 3:07:53 AM

+1 Boost

I love the photo here of a rusting Toyota, Toyota made the executive decision to use cheaper metal so it would result in them rusting faster,all to save a few bucks.Although I hope they get back to making quality.