What it will cost to obtain ISO 9001 certification depends on your approach. There are two different types of costs to begin with:
- Costs to implement ISO 9001;
- Costs of actualy getting the ISO 9001 certification.
Before we look at the costs, it's important to determine your approach. This approach also depends on your motivation behind obtaining ISO 9001 certification.
Meeting the ISO standard: what is your motivation?
It is important to establish a few things before you start implementing the ISO 9001 standard:
- Do you need to acquire ISO 9001 urgently for a tender or customer requirement?
- Do you already have the right knowledge about the standard internally and therefore know what to do?
- Or do you have time and you want to use ISO 9001 to further structure your organisation?
Based on these conclusions, you determine:
- How much support you need for the implementation;
- How much you can already do internally;
- In what timeframe you want to obtain the certificate.
In addition, you should also think carefully in advance about the period after you have obtained ISO 9001 certification, because costs will also be made during this period. Once the certificate has been obtained, you will need to continue working with it in order to optimise your quality and continue to save money. Your organisation is assessed every year by a certifying body to determine whether it still meets the standard.
By getting the basics right from the start, with the right support, the right knowledge or the right resources for the management system, the investment in the future will be lower.
Orientation phase: determine the approach of your ISO 9001 certification
You begin by determining the approach. Depending on your previous conclusions, you decide how to proceed:
- Use a software tool like My ISO Genius;
- Attending a training course, after which you get to work with this knowledge;
- Getting support from a consultant or outsourcing.
Use of My ISO Genius
My ISO Genius is designed for organisations that want to start setting up and implementing their management system on their own, without having the right knowledge. My ISO Genius has done the work for you: everything is sorted out and clearly laid out. All you have to do is follow the steps that My ISO Genius has set out for you.
Next, you will elaborate your management system within the software solution. Even after the implementation you continue to work within My ISO Genius, so you never have to search and think about whether you continue to meet the ISO 9001 standard. Do you have a question or get stuck somewhere? You can always rely on our support desk. My ISO Genius is the tool with which you assure yourself of ISO certification.
Following a training course
Various parties (for example, our sister organisation Online ISO Academy) provide training in the field of standards. By following a training course, you will receive a clear and practical explanation of what the standard requires from you, and you will know how to get started. The fees for an ISO 9001 standards training course amount to an average of € 450.- excluding VAT for 1-day courses and € 800 excluding VAT for 2-day courses. To reduce costs, you could consider using e-learning modules.
The advantage of this method is that the standard is clearly explained to you. You therefore spend much less time figuring out what the standard really means. There are also disadvantages: you get all the information in a very short time, so you do not absorb everything. You often don't get the access to formats and sample documents, which means you have to develop your own methods for many of the working methods. As a result, preparing for implementation takes up a lot of time.
Get support from a consultant
With the right knowledge, ISO management systems are easy to set up yourself. As already indicated, acquiring this knowledge can take a lot of time. That is why organisations choose to temporarily bring in an external colleague in the person of a consultant, for example from our sister organisation KAM Consultants. The advantage of an external consultant is that you have access to the knowledge of a consultant who coaches you, guides you and clearly tells you what needs to be done.
The consultant also provides the right formats for this. You can also outsource the entire process of setting up and implementing the ISO management system to an external consultant. This way, you spend as little time as possible on the activities and you are assured of a successful result. However, the investment that needs to be made for this is not desirable for every organisation. The costs of such an implementation process depend on the size of the organisation. Think of an investment of at least € 3,000. - excluding VAT for very small organisations to investments above € 20,000.- excluding VAT for organisations of 200 employees or more.
Do you want to save costs on your ISO 9001 implementation by doing it yourself? First take a complete inventory
Before you can finally determine the best approach for your organisation to implement the ISO 9001 standard, it is important to have insight into the requirements of the standard. For this the use of the ebook is recommended. Don't have it yet? Then download the ebook for free now and make it easy for yourself to take stock of the situation correctly.
Go through the checklist carefully and see which subjects are already clear in your company. Maybe there are already work instructions that meet the standard, or only need to be adjusted. This saves a lot of work; what you already know, you don't have to find out. What you don't know yet, will end up on the 'to do list' in your step-by-step plan.
In order to know which approach is the best, first make an inventory of the following subjects:
- Which person(s) will you appoint to work out and carry out the project;
- What do you still need to find out from the checklist;
- What do you already know and therefore no longer need to find out;
- What do you not yet know and need to find out.
Now you know how much you still have to do. If you then link this to the amount of time and budget you have for implementing ISO 9001, you can make an educated decision.
Turn your quality management into a successful system with My ISO Genius
Put all these tips into practice and you'll see that it drastically reduces your costs. Are you where you need to be? Most likely not. It's a journey that costs time, effort and, really, money. To ensure that your certification will ultimately make you money, there is a total package that takes the hassle out of certification even further.
My ISO Genius ISO 9001 certification is the ultimate way to set up and carry out your entire certification process yourself, saving you even more on the cost of ISO certification. This often makes it the cheapest solution for achieving your ISO 9001 certification. With My ISO Genius you get the opportunity to be in contact with your personal ISO advisor at all times. The ebook and checklist are created from My ISO Genius, so everything fits together seamlessly. Don't make it more difficult than it needs to be and get yourself certified. You won't regret it at all.
Costs for ISO 9001 certification
Obtaining the ISO 9001 certificate also requires an assessment by an external certification body. One of the organisations that ISO Genius often works with is The Certification Leaders. The first year of certification costs are higher than the following years. In the first year more time is spent, because all documentation has to be assessed beforehand.
You enter into an agreement with a certifying body for 3 years. Your certificate will remain valid for that period, but annual control audits will be conducted.
An arrangement with a certifying body has the following set-up:
- Year 1: A document audit and certification audit;
- Year 2: 1st control audit:
- Year 3: 2nd control audit.
The exact costs depend on the size of your organisation. The time a certification body must charge is regulated in the standards. Therefore, they can make little distinction between them. To estimate: For companies with up to 5 employees, the costs for the first year are between € 1,500.- and € 1,750.- and the following years between € 600.- and € 900.- for the external audit. Per 10 additional employees, the additional costs are approximately € 500.- per year.
Want to get started right away with obtaining ISO 9001 at the lowest possible cost?
Download our ISO 9001 checklist now to make the first inventory and get started with My ISO Genius.
