The Quality Working Group was set up at the beginning of 2007 as a platform of dialogue on quality issues between the manufacturers and the logistics service providers. The group has enjoyed growing success and attendance. In addition to LSPs and OEMs, professional survey companies and trailer manufacturers participate regularly to the meetings. The Group’s initial mandate was for discussion on the harmonisation potential on a European scale in fields like operations standards, auditing and damage handling.
The first achievement of the Group was the publication of the ECG Operations Quality Manual (OQM) for cars and light commercial vehicles that has been endorsed at the time by 13 leading European car manufacturers. The manual is becoming an industry-wide standard and has already been included by some manufacturers in their tenders. The OQM, constantly updated, has been translated to many languages with the help of ECG members. In the wake of this success, in 2012 the Group decided to prepare an ECG Operations Quality Manual for Commercial Vehicles (last updated in March 2022) and on High & Heavy cargo (last updated in January 2020).
The second major achievement of the Group was the publication of a common damage coding standard developed together with the American Automotive Industry Action Group (AIAG): the Global Vehicle Damage Codes Standard.
The Group also decided to create a sub-group to properly address operations standards and harmonisation issues regarding electric and alternative fuel vehicles. The result of the work was a chapter on Alternative Fuel Vehicles in the Operations Quality Manual which was reviewed and improved in version 9 of the OQM, while a standalone chapter on the transport of cars in containers was added in the latest, version 10 of the manual.
In recent years, the Quality Group was pulling together the various OEM requirements on a certain field in order to help the LSPs. Subsequently, the following overviews were published:
Good industry practices have also been published:
- VIN label standard (together with Odette International)
- Recommendation on information to be shared with the LSPs
- Visual Inspection Guidelines
- Full Body Covers in the supply chain
- Manual on the transport and handling of used cars
The Quality Working Group usually gathers at hybrid meetings every 3-4 months.
Current projects
The continuous review of the Operations Quality Manual for cars and LCVs and the handling of electric vehicles, especially in a maritime environment are on-going topics for discussion. In this regard we have relayed the guidelines for Alternative Fuel Vehicles which the European Maritime Safety Agency published in May 2022.
Latest meeting
The first joint meeting of the Quality and Maritime & Ports Working Groups took place in Zeebrugge on January 21-22 2025. The interest in this joint gathering stemmed from the overlapping topics, such as BEV transport, fires on board ships and the transport of cars in containers, among others. The event was supported by ECG member and local host Port of Antwerp-Bruges, as well as long-time ECG partner C.A.R. Consulting.
ECG Members can access further information and the event’s presentation by clicking here.
How to join
For more information or to join the WG please contact Szilvi Kiss.