What to know about an interim PPAP Approval

August 15, 2019

Upon Submission, a PPAP has 3 possible warrant disposition Status:

• Rejected
• Approved
• Interim Approved

When is the interim PPAP approval considered?

While the focus must be to have full PPAP Approval, there are some instances where an interim PPAP approval can be considered:

• Documentation issues: In cases where minor corrections to the PPAP documentation are needed and these corrections do not affect the form , fit or function of the parts, an interim PPAP approval can be granted for a short period of time allowing the supplier to ship parts while the documentation is corrected
• Dimensional or technical features not being met: In this case, the Interim PPAP approval must be backed up by an APPROVED document from the Customer’s Engineering Dept. such as a deviation, concession, among others.

Why is the interim PPAP approval so important?

As a general principle, product validation test (a major APQP milestone) requires to have full PPAP approval before starting. Also, the receipt of serial production parts should be avoided if full PPAP approval is missing. In some special cases, these 2 roadblocks can be overcome with an interim PPAP approval.

What factors are critical for success regarding interim PPAP approval?

• Interim PPAP approval can only be granted when the non-compliances that are preventing the approval have been clearly defined and there is a corrective action plan agreed between the supplier and the customer to fix these non-compliances.
• The supplier is responsible of implementing containment actions to ensure that only acceptable material is being shipped to the customer and this material must be properly identified.
• If the Engineering document is not approved, we strongly recommend to hold the interim PPAP approval.
• The Deviation or Concession MUST include either an expiration date or a maximum number of pieces allowed. From our experience, controlling the number of pieces is harder than controlling the date. However, this is a decision that you should make as a team.