Quality Management System For Manufacturers And Contractors Of Pre-Cast Pile Foundation In Vietnam

Recently, Vietnam has kept highly economic growth in both public and private sectors. Therefore so many construction projects including buildings, factories and infrastructures have been invested to meet the country’s economic demands. Realizing the benefits of quality management, both investors and contractors attempt to improve the quality of the local construction industry.

Quality has been found as the most key components of project success. Deficiencies and errors in construction will require reworks or will result in failures after a product has been delivered to a customer. Such failures may result in claims, customer dissatisfaction, or dire consequences to the user.

So far, there are so many projects with piled foundation in Vietnam construction industry, especially building projects. Some serious problems in building foundation have been found with too much settlement of foundation. One of the most serious mistakes in both designing and construction of piled foundation was the collapsed 12-storey building in Shanghai City, China in March 2009. After those problems, not only owner, designer and consultants but also contractors are more and more concerned about quality management system.

The negative impact of indirect rework on profits can have serious consequences on projects’ and an organizations’ costs. For example, once design errors or omissions are identified in contract documentation, rework will occur. This process may continue to magnify until ultimately, the design firm finds itself in serious financial difficulties due to the prolonged impact of an unheeded increase in rework costs, coupled with a declining professional image and low morale.

Therefore, quality management system for the piling foundation works is really necessary for all of owner, designer, contractor and manufacturer to assure quality and prevent any unexpected hazards.

Mr. Pham Quoc Hung made a research which major objectives were to; (1) study quality management system in manufacturer of pre-cast pile and contractor of piling works for construction of project’s foundation; and (2) recommend the framework of quality management system and project quality plan based on a lesson learnt from these real cases study.

Conclusion

In order to assure the quality of construction works, it is first the contractors who determine the quality of construction project. The quality management program aims to find the most efficient way of managing the quality of work as to satisfy customers’ requirements. This study applied a framework of QMS using ISO9000 for manufacturer of pre-cast PC pile and PQP using ISO9000 for piling construction works in Vietnam.

The case studies have been conducted to investigate the construction methods and processes associated with quality assurance. The framework of QMS as presented in the report has been developed based on existing standards and regulations.

In these case studies, all major processes and detailed instructions for fabrication of pre-cast PC pile and construction of piling works have been presented. These are guidelines for contractors who implemented the QMS and PQP to achieve quality targets in construction.

The case studies found out significant tangible and intangible benefits for manufacturer of pre-cast PC pile and for contractor of piling construction project when applying QMS and PQP using ISO9000.

The most common problems related to managing quality often occurred during construction implementation and developments are found as follows:

Table 1: Problem and solution on implementing QMS and PQP



Recommendations for improvement

After understanding how the manufacturer of PC pile and contractor of piling construction project implement the QMS and PQP using ISO9000 Approach, recommendations for improvement can be as follows:

1) It is very important to have available resources with continual training and improving for better applying the QMS and the PQP. It helps the manufacturer and contractor of pre-cast piling foundation to always run smoothly for ensuring the quality targets.

2) So many benefits in implementation and development of QMS and PQP using ISO9000, some problems occurring can be reduced and eliminated with more detailed supervision and instructions.

3) ISO9000 is a framework for processing paper. However, other factors can be very important to contribute good quality products such as:
- Company culture from the beginning;
- Company strategy led by commitment of strong management;
- Company vision and policy in concentrating on satisfaction of customers and employees;
- The trend to exist in highly competitive condition forces the company to ensure its quality products;
- All company people have the same targets on quality.

His thesis abstract is copied and posted.

Abstract

ISO9000 has become more and more popular to apply for every modern business organization on all over the world. ISO9000 is considered as the most effective ways to apply for quality managing system of any company.

The study discussed the quality management system for manufacturer and contractor related to implementing construction services of pre-cast pile foundation:
- QMS using ISO9000 of the pre-cast pile manufacturing factory;
- Project quality plan with QMS using ISO9000 of piling contractor.

The main objective of this study is to recommend and develop a framework of quality management system using ISO9000 for pile manufacturer and project quality plan for piling contractor that can be effectively used to manage the performance of highway contractors in Vietnam.

An exploratory approach shall be adopted by reviewing the available literature to develop a quality management system (QMS) for pile manufacturer and project quality plan (PQP) for piling contractor and find out how is the applicability and effectiveness of this QMS and PQP in a real case study projects. The case study projects are aimed to answer following questions:
- Are the QMS and PQP applicable?
- Are the QMS and PQP effective and how is the effectiveness?
- What and how are the tangible and intangible benefits of the QMS and the PQP?
- What are the benefits and problems and impacts in implementation and development of the QMS and the PQP?

In case study, all important processes of pre-cast pile manufacturing and piling works have been clearly identified and developed with full details of guidelines for applying to achieve quality targets and satisfaction of customers.

Report of the findings and suggestions can show much more effectiveness of using ISO9000 for QMS and PQP in pre-cast pile manufacturer and piling contractor with their limited resources to achieve much better quality outcomes.