News

Following a stringent audit by the British Standards Institute, the company has successfully been accredited with BS EN ISO 9001:2000. This standard gives even more focus to customer satisfaction using mechanisms to ensure that Quality is not just for the shop floor but is company wide and everyone’s responsibility.
We embarked on this journey in 2000 with our Team Leader Supervisory Management course and this is the latest reward following the culture change that this has brought about. In recognition of this achievement, Sandra Haslam has been promoted to Quality Manager.
‘This is an exciting time for our business and I wish Sandra every success in her new role, I know she will look forward to the challenges ahead,’ said Steve Wilkinson, Managing Director.
‘This new accreditation supersedes BS EN ISO 9002:1994. It’s purpose is to provide the building blocks and tools for a continuous improvement process, which with key performance indicators throughout the business will ensure that we continue to work with our customers and provide them, and improve on, our excellent level of service,’ commented Sandra Haslam, Quality Manager.

SSF are pleased to continue to be involved with a special research project. DNV of Bergen, Norway, have established a Joint Industry Project (JIP) with objectives to provide better understanding of the factors which influence the deterioration and corrosion of fasteners and to improve practice for corrosion protection of bolting in atmospheric, splash and subsea zones. This will then assist industry in better practice for the specifying, use and maintenance of such fasteners. The JIP includes a 10 year exposure test. All fasteners were manufactured and supplied by SSF. "When DNV approached us for assistance with the JIP, we were only too pleased to help. SSF's involvement in this type of project along with main participants such as BP Exploration Operating Co Ltd, Enviropeel Intl Ltd, Norske Conoco AS and Nexans, Norway, further underlines our commitment to quality products for any specific application and our ongoing strategy to work closely with our partners to further each of our businesses for the future," said Matthew Tongue, Sales Executive, "we have already supplied fasteners in Alloy K-500, 725, 718&686 and are now working on test bolting in A286 660."

Steve Hopkinson, Material Control Supervisor, was pleased to advise that SSF's own bar processing shop has completed its 50,000th order. The plant was originally installed to allow us to manage our processing of raw material in house and has evolved from purely centreless grinding to also peeling and reeling. 'This facility has proved itself to be a huge success and indeed has enabled us to meet customer demands for fasteners produced from material that is not widely available without relying on external sources that have historically been unreliable. Coupled with our flexible night shift workers, we can react very quickly to urgent requirements and we have seen that the processing shop very rarely doesnt feature in the top 3 sections for output across the business. It is difficult to think of the business without this facility.'

David Barber, Commercial Manager, has announced that SSF will be exhibiting at Valve World 2002. 'This is a key exhibition for SSF and we will again be fielding a full compliment of sales executives to cater for clients old and new over the 3 days. Historically we have seen a great deal of new opportunities generated by the exhibition and I look forward to greeting all our visitors'. The event is taking place in Maastricht from 12th to 14th November, 2002. For more details about the event, please do not hesitate to contact David.

As part of SSF's continual improvement program and our goal of achieving ISO 9001:2002 by the end of the year, our Quality Assurance dept has launched an online Customer Satisfaction Questionnaire. It addresses the five main areas of the operation of the business with an overall satisfaction score at the end. 'Whilst this is only a very small survey, we expect to utilise the results throughout the organisation by posting the feedback on the companys Intranet website. Employees can then access the information and find out what our customers think about performance in their area and indeed take ownership for the feedback and take necessary action if required,' commented Sandra Haslam, Deputy Quality Manager, 'this is another stage in the planned quality orientated program that we have devised to get closer to our customers.'

Since January 2002, SSF has been offering the facility to quote and accept orders placed in Euros. From the outset this has proved to be very popular with our European clients and we have seen the number of Euro orders that we have received grow from strength to strength. However, September has brought us our largest Euro order so far for over 25,000 Sanicro 28 fasteners. So far over 100 of our key accounts now trade in Euros. 'As the global village evolves we must not see currency issues as a problem but an opportunity, an opportunity to remove any barrier for anyone, anywhere that wishes to purchase from SSF. In some ways it is the fact that SSF will go that little bit further, that makes us one of the best fastener manufacturers in the world,' said Steve Wilkinson, Managing Director.

It has been a very busy year so far for us at SSF. In May we were given the go-ahead from our parent company FCx Intl plc to buy a brand new CNC machining centre. This machine was delivered and commisionned early in August. Operators, Graham Tann and Philip Bradley had already been sent on an intensive course for CNC programming back in June and couldn't wait to get started ! 'We both were looking forward to getting our hands on the new machine and getting it up and running as quickly as possible,' said Graham Tann, Team Leader.
'This machine was purchased to compliment existing automatic machines predominantly for nut production. We are now 4 weeks further on and are already seeing the huge benefits that this type of technology can offer. Whilst we are still learning about this new technology, I am delighted with the progress that we have made so far,' commented Gordon Staines, Production Director.

During the late part of 2001 and early 2002, two warehouses adjoining the current 'Site 2' manufacturing operation became available. Plans were drawn up as to the feasibility of locating the plant from 'Site 1' in one of the warehouses and providing an extended stores and despatch area with larger canteen facilities in the other. It was decided that logistically and operationally this would be the way forward for the business. During July the huge task of relocating 48 machines plus the stores area was undertaken. 'We phased the operation over 3 weeks to enable us to provide the least amount of disruption to our customers,' commented Gordon Staines, Production Director. 'The relocation went completely to plan and I cannot thank the team enough for their support and hard work during this huge undertaking. This move has provided us with not only better warehousing facilities and improved vehicular access but also an excellent working environment that all employees can be proud of.'