According to IAF MD 1:2018, clause 7.3 Calculation of Audit Time, the reduction of audit time per sampled site shall not be greater than 50%.
How can we proceed with calculations for small simple sites (e.g. one room storage, small office with 1-5 employees)?
There are usually simple processes to be audited, which usually may not take more then 1-2 hours. When adding more schemes, even with the 50% reduction applied, the time increases a lot and we easily end up with 1-1,5 MDs for 1-person administrative place.
September 2019
According to IAF MD 5 Table QMS 1:
For 1-5 employees – audit time is 1.5 audit-days (stage 1 + stage 2),
According to clause 4.1, on-site duration of MS audit should not be less than 80% of audit time (it means, off-site audit should not be more than 20% of audit time),If CB wants to apply reduction (based on suitable justifications) as 50% of audit time, then adjusted new audit time becomes 0.75 audit-days. Then;
On-site: 0.75 * 80% = 0.60 man-days (this number should be adjusted nearest half day, finally it becomes 0.5 audit-days. It means, one auditor will spend 4 hours in one selected site)
Off-site: 0.75 * 20% = 0.15 audit-daysIAF MD 5
2.2.3 If after the calculation the result is a decimal number, the number of days should be adjusted to the nearest half day (e.g.: 5.3 audit days becomes5.5 audit days, 5.2 audit days becomes 5 audit days).Note: If the CAB cannot satisfy above approach, it can use another calculation method or approach provided that suitable justification concerning Note 1 and Note 2 under the clause 2.2.4 of IAF MD 5. In this case, the AB should try to evaluate the effectiveness of the new approach of the CAB in the assessments (office and/or witnesses).
IAF MD 5
2.2.4 To help ensure the effectiveness of the audit, the CAB should also consider the composition and size of the audit team (e.g.½ day with 2 auditors may not be as effective as a one day auditwith 1 auditor or 1 audit day with one lead auditor and one technical expert is more effective than 1 auditor day without the technical expert).Note 1: ABs may require a CAB to demonstrate that the average audit time of specified clients is neither significantly more nor less than the audit time calculated from tables QMS1 and EMS1.
Note 2: CABs that work primarily in high risk or complex industries are likely to have an average higher than the tables and CABs that work primarily in low risk industries are likely to have an average lower than the tables.
Notwithstanding the above answer, the primary reuqirement is for the CB to provide sufficient time for a complete and effective audit (ISO/IEC 17021-1: 9.1.4.1), and that this should be justified when a calculation is used.
(It should be noted that a Project is now underway at the IAF TC to reconsider the way in which Audit Time is calculated).