ISO 19011 - Section 14
Explanations in Plain English
ISO 19011 - Section 14 - Audit Completion and
Follow-up
Audit Completion:
The audit is completed when all activities described in the audit plan have been
carried out and the approved audit report has been distributed.
Documents pertaining to the audit should be retained by agreement between the
participating parties and in accordance with audit program procedures and applicable statutory, regulatory and
contractual requirements.
If your company is registered/certified to one or more of the international
standards you must retain the audit records. Audit records must be available for your third-party auditors to
review for compliance to the standard's requirements and effectiveness of the audit process. Audit results are also
required to be reviewed at the management review meetings. Audit results are also, a significant input for
continual improvement.
Unless required by law, the audit team and those responsible for managing the
audit program should not disclose the contents of documents, or any other information obtained during the audit, or
the audit report, to any other party without the explicit approval of the auditee. If disclosure of the contents of
an audit document is required, the audit client and auditee should be informed as soon as possible.
Conducting audit follow-up:
The conclusions of the audit may indicate the need for corrective, preventive or
improvement actions. These actions are usually decided and undertaken by the auditee within an agreed timeframe and
are not considered to be part of the audit. The auditee should keep the audit client informed of the status of
these actions.
The completion and effectiveness of corrective action must be verified. This
verification may be part of a subsequent audit. The audit program may specify follow-up by members of the audit
team, which adds value by using their expertise. In such cases, care should be taken to maintain independence in
subsequent audit activities.
The auditor or audit team members should not be involved in developing or
implementing any corrective actions for nonconformances arising from an audit they conducted. Involving yourself in
corrective actions gives the impression of ownership. Ownership involves bias.
Additional explanations and defintions are included in the ebook
below.
The links below are
excerpts from the our e-book
"Explanations and
Definitions for ISO 19011:2002" 
Section 1. ISO 19011 Scope
reference and definitions
Section 2. ISO 19011 Principles of
auditing
Section 3. ISO 19011 Managing an
audit program
Section 4. ISO 19011 Audit program
implementation
Section 5. ISO 19011 Audit
activities
Section 6. ISO 19011 Preparing for
onsite activities
Section 7. ISO 19011 Conducting
onsite activities
Section 8. ISO 19011 What the
auditor is looking for
Section 9 ISO 19011 Audit
reporting
Section 10. ISO 19011 Audit
techniques
Section 11. ISO 19011 Audit
path
Section 12. ISO 19011 Effective
communications
Section 13. ISO 19011
Sampling
Section 14. ISO 19011 Audit
completion and follow-up
Section 15. ISO 19011 Competence
and evaluation of auditors
This represents a summary of the section in ISO 19011:2002. It's
suggested that you obtain a copy of our ebook to refer to when auditing.
EBook "Explanations and Definitions for ISO 19011:2002
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