As part of its efforts to constantly improve its support for institutional missions, the Bank of Italy has acquired UNI EN ISO 9001:2015 certification for its centralized procurement service, awarded by the accredited certifying agency DNV, one of the world’s leading certifiers.
The Bank’s decision to obtain recognition of its centralized procurement management system’s compliance with the most recent version of the ISO 9001 standard was voluntary, as a means to continue improving the quality, efficiency and transparency of its procurement procedures.
Receipt of ISO 9001:2015 certification is of strategic importance since it demonstrates that the Bank’s organization, procedures and resources conform to the requirements of the new Public Procurement Law (Legislative Decree 50/2016) for the certification of contracting authorities.
More specifically, compliance with the new version of the ISO 9001 standard ensures that the quality management system of the Directorate General for Property and Tenders is able to:
- analyse the external and internal environment in which the Bank operates in order to identify all stakeholders and to properly manage factors affecting the conformity of products and services and customer satisfaction;
- identify risks and opportunities within the reference framework, employing a risk-based thinking approach to operating procedure management;
- establish the foundation for the development of the concept of sustainable quality, in particular for energy management systems and to enhance the Bank’s environmental performance.
The quality management system’s special features include:
- widening the scope of application: the certified activities embrace the entire procurement life cycle, from identifying needs to managing procurement contracts, planning initiatives, designing projects and selecting the contractor;
- a detailed description of operating procedures, essential for spreading best practices and reinforcing organizational knowledge;
- careful preparation of quality plans to both foster communication between the various internal units and structures and manage relationships with external suppliers;
- management of operational risks inherent in procurement by drawing up ‘response plans’ and implementing mitigation measures;
- design and implementation of a clear set of quality indicators for procedures and products/services, deemed key to measuring the degree to which targets have been reached and the level of user satisfaction;
- capitalizing on internal know-how by providing information on and sharing projects, methods and the most significant experiences;
- the systematic conduct of internal audit activities by the Directorate General’s structures to identify corrective actions and improvements.
