Implement Layered Process Audits (LPA) with the UrAudits auditing app

June 28 , 2024

When producing a product, it goes through multiple levels, and each level requires different audits and inspections. Scheduling audits at each level is mandatory.

To overcome this scheduling, most organizations in the manufacturing sector introduced Layered process audits (LPA) to enhance their product quality management and ensure that this standard process is always used on the factory site.

Even most businesses have started using digital audit tools like UrAudits in the LPA to slow the workers’ load, as each level requires multiple paper tasks and a 24-hour presence on the site.

What is an LPA?

LPA is a term introduced by the automotive industry in the vintage era, especially during oil crises. Now, it is used in almost all manufacturing sectors.

The LPA is a method of auditing that focuses on assessing and verifying how products are manufactured rather than inspecting the end product. It has multiple layers or levels, performing inspections at different product manufacturing stages.

This method allows inspectors to detect issues during product-making and identify the root causes.

Overall, this method ensures that the manufacturing process follows all compliance so that the end result gives the best performance for the users.

Who performs LPA Audits?

LPA involves all department levels, from supervisors and team leaders to internal auditors, department managers, and executive management.

This involvement displays the compliance of all people in the management job.

In the LPA audits, manufacturing audit checklists are important. Different checklists are used by different layers of staff involved in manufacturing or for all management levels to conduct frequent audits.

Why perform Layered Audits?

When a management team uses an LPA, they can improve their quality control plans, detect issues that occur mostly, provide solutions to these issues right at the time they are found, and normalize the procedures to remove noncompliance.

A strong LPS will support you in lowering wastage, crap material, and rework—your product uniformity increases. You can build a roadmap for betterment. You can promote communication among management and workers.

How to Perform Layered Process Audits?

Let’s note down the process step by step in performing the LPA.

Stage 1: Describe goals and scope

What is the purpose of doing your LPAs? What goal can you achieve using LPA? Are your goals or purpose to reduce errors, improve the process, and enhance compliance? If yes, decide which level of process or areas need auditing most based on the level of risk involved in these.

Stage 2: Bring together Cross-Functional Squad.

Describe the workflow or series of steps to do an LPA. Gather all employees (management, supervisors, and frontline) of all levels into one zone to perform audits and inspections at all levels of product making.

Stage 3:  Pick the most suitable LPA auditing app

When selecting a digital audit app, consider features such as scheduling audits, customized checklists, real-time reporting, strong workflow management, and real-time data collection.

Stage 4: Make a digital LPA checklist

Making a checklist using paper and pencil can be useless, prone to human error, and results in too many messy cabinets. Instead, opt for a digital audit from the UrAudits auditing application to create a factory audit checklist.

UrAudits audit app features easy customization, the ability to attach as many images as you prefer and custom-built templates. You can also customize the checklist to fit the changing needs of your product production and stay relevant to your required inspection.

Stage 5: LPA training

Give all the employees, from flow workers to managers to executive management, training on how LPAs work. First, guide them through the LPA process and then show them how to use the app. Ensure that the entire team understands their role and expectations from that role.

Stage 6: Conduct Audits

Make a schedule for your LPA, including when to perform it (weekly, daily, monthly, or quarterly). Prepare inspectors with a digital checklist and ask them to assess the processes they are assigned to, document nonconformities, and confirm adherence.

Get the UrAudits digital auditing app now. It allows your team to use a checklist on smartphones or tablets to enable LPA audits in a digital factory setting.

Step 7: Reporting

Once you and the team are done with auditing and inspection per their assigned tasks, access your inspection data to detect trends and issues that appear the most. The generated audit report should cover findings, suggest remedial actions, and check progress.

What is inspected throughout an LPA Audit?

The inspection and audit begin with a deep overview of the given instructions for each manufacturing layer or level.

Once all these instructions are reviewed in depth, the inspecting and audit team will assess the strength of each layer.

Also, LPA process covers:

• Discussions with the staff involved in the manufacturing process
• Noticing the product-making process
• Checking the QMS or quality management system
• Verifying the records and paperwork and making correction
• Examining how workers manage the inventory
• Confirming that the process is in action per the standards manufacturing SOPs or applicable regulation.

LPA Frequency Checks

The LPA frequency checks rely on the hierarchical level of the staff performing the inspection and audit.

In general, an LPA plan covers three layers. Together, they mean many audits are planned regularly.

• Layer1: Daily —at every shift, the team lead or supervisors perform inspections and audits
• Layer 2: Weekly — senior or semi-executive position staff who conduct weekly or bi-weekly inspections and audits.
• Layer 3: monthly or quarterly— executive, upper management, or plant managers do audits.

Go for UrAudits, a user-friendly Auditing app for Streamlining LPAs

The LPA process is complex as it requires multiple checklists to be completed by multiple workers from different management levels. The LPA audit needs to be performed daily or weekly. Thus, the appraisal cost, a Cost of Quality (CoQ), can rapidly increase.

Keeping this situation in mind, many manufacturing plants are using an LPA auditing app to digitize their layered procedure inspection and eliminate manual work.

UrAudits, your auditing solution, comes to help all the manufacturing facilities in the form of an audit app, where workers can assign multiple actions to team members, customize pre-made checklist templates, reschedule missed audits, and get real-time notifications and alerts.

Pros of digitalizing the LPA process

Let’s take a deep look at the advantages of digitizing the LPA process:

• The worker can attach images to the report to show when something doesn’t meet the standards. Also, comments or annotations can be inserted when needed.
• Any issues or defects can be visible to the management or leaders immediately.
• As discussed above, assign a task to the team member and get alerts or notifications of what the assignee is doing and what inspection he/she has performed to verify the team member doesn’t overlook any daily audits.
• You can track trends, like how often a specific problem happens, how frequent the audits are, and other important information.
• Allot corrective measures of the reoccurring issues to the right team or supplier and trace how to get that solved. You can get alerts and place notifications if there are delays or the same problems keep happening.
• Save your tedious paper tasks and time; all the information is saved in the app. No mess up your mind from transferring data from papers to emails or spreadsheets.
• Use a to-do checklist and make adjustments to those checklists wherever you are.

Beyond LPA: Simplify Safety and Quality Inspections

Besides digitizing your LPA, you can enhance your process performance and quality management via digital LPA.

Most manufacturing businesses use digital audit apps not for LPA purposes but for other internal inspection and audit purposes.

UrAudits is helpful for various manufacturing processes and sites besides LPA. Here are the things you can use our auditing platform:

• Workers first need guidance on how LPA works. With the UrAudits inspection app, you can train staff regarding LPA compliance and how it performs.
• Build a checklist to templatize the LPA process
• You can trace the auditing and inspection status at each layer or level.
• With a few clicks, you can identify the origins of the issues in the production procedure
• Follow up progress and allow corrective measures to the desired third party or team using executive dashboards.

FAQs for Layered Process Audits

How many layers are there in LPA?

There are three layers in total: Management duty, element compliance, and procedure efficiency. These three layers deliver an all-inclusive valuation of the current product-making process in the factory.

Why perform LPA?

When you conduct LPA, you inspect each stage of the product’s production. You can check whether the process is progressing as expected and detect possible improvements. You can also determine strategies to address non-conformities or noncompliance while standardizing procedures.

What is a process audit?

A process audit checks how accurately a product-making process is going in the factory by examining the outputs, inputs, and overall productivity of the process to detect issues and suggest improvements.

Conclusion

So, take a step forward and implement LPA in your factor using the most user-friendly app on the market, the UrAudits audit app.

Download our auditing app for Android or inspection app for iOS or web apps for a 14-day trial period.