Product quality is one of the most important indicators of the entire enterprise. Its increase strongly determines the success and survival of the enterprise in a modern market, the introduction of innovations, the pace of technological progress, as well as the saving of various resources that are used in this enterprise.
The national economy can also greatly benefit from the production of high quality products. Indeed, in this case, the export potential grows, the authority of the state in the world community. That is why it is necessary to carry out a focused and constant work of producers to significantly improve the quality of their products compared to peers produced by competitors.
Such a concept as product quality is strictly regulated by the state standard of the Russian Federation.
What is quality in general? This is nothing more than the totality of all the properties of a product that determine its suitability for meeting certain needs in accordance with its purpose.
Product quality is a relative category. It is fixed for a certain period of time, and then simply changes when a more advanced technology appears. Evaluation of product quality occurs by comparing all its properties with a certain standard. They can serve the best foreign or domestic samples or the requirements that are enshrined in the technical conditions or standards. But the consumer is still given the main place in the process of assessing the quality of services or products. And the function of standards is to regulate and consolidate the progressive experience that has been accumulated in the field of quality.
Standardization is norm-setting activity, which finds the most rational norms and fixes them in various regulatory documents - instructions, standards, methods and so on. Standardization should create a system of regulatory and technical documentation that will determine progressive requirements for services or products manufactured for the needs of the population, economy, export, and defense of the country. She also exercises control over the correct use of all this documentation. The standard is developed for material objects, rules, norms and requirements.
Product quality at the enterprise is measured by ten key indicators: purpose, manufacturability, unification and standardization, reliability, safety, aesthetic, ergonomic, patent law, environmental, and transportability. The combination of all these indicators forms the quality of products. Any product must be pleasing to the eye, be reliable, functional, that is, satisfy the needs for which it was intended. But in addition to indicators, price is also of great importance. After all, the consumer always compares the set of properties of a product and its price.
Therefore, it is very important to identify and classify the costs of product quality. According to their intended purpose, they are divided into those that are designed to ensure quality, improve quality and manage quality.
Quality assurance costs are all costs that have been incurred in order to satisfy all the requirements set by the consumer. Quality improvement costs are aimed at meeting the anticipated requirements of consumers. And the costs of quality management are needed to develop and implement preventive and corrective measures, which are necessary in order to eliminate identified or prevent potential non-compliance of services (products) with the requirements for it.