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HISTORICAL PAGE -- MINA ARTICLES FROM 1998 UP TO EARLY 1999
removed from the main welcome page to permit faster page loading.
rev JAN. 10, 1999:
Its now official. Denny Hastert (R. IL) is now Speaker of the House.
updated DEC. 20 1998, rev FEB. 27 1999:
If Congressman Denny Hastert (R. IL) becomes Speaker of the House, the fastener industry will have a very influential voice in Congress. His home district encompasses the location of many USA fastener manufacturers plants in Illinois. However we are not sure of his position on imports. The Statement of then Congressman J. Dennis Hastert (R-IL-14) at the Hearing on the Fastener Quality Act Before the House Subcommittee on Technology October 8, 1999. See also another MINA prior item about the congressman.
updated Dec. 13 1998:
MINA has published a summary table of the public comments received from the P.L.105-234 Fastener Quality Act; Statutorily Required Study which ended on November 30, 1998.
Of the 137 responses (649 pages) that NIST received*: 38% favor repeal of the Fastener Quality Act. 66.4% favor changes to the Fastener Quality Act. Only 5.1% favor implementation of the Fastener Quality Act.

*The reason for the total exceeding 100% is that some commenters favored repeal, or if that was not possible, then they would favor significant changes to the Fastener Quality Act.

WHAT'S NEW! -- INDEX:

This will be only updated on a monthly basis after Dec. 07, 1999

  1. WHATS NEW ON THE FQA CONGRESSIONAL ACTIONS:    last updated or revised: 05/27/99 -- Generally located at or near the top of this page.
  2. WHATS NEW ON THE FQA IMPLEMENTATION DELAY:    last updated or revised: 05/22/99 -- Generally located at or near the top of this page.
  3. WHATS NEW ON FQA LABORATORY ACCREDITATION STATUS:    last updated or revised: 06/09/99
  4. WHATS NEW ON FQA QS-9000 SELF DECLARED PROVISIONAL LISTING STATUS:    last updated or revised: 01/10/99
  5. WHATS NEW ON THE FQA/PTO HEAD MARKINGS:    last updated or revised: 01/10/99
  6. WHATS NEW FROM NIST -- FEDERAL REGISTER NOTICES NOT MENTIONED ON THE OFFICIAL NIST FQA WEBSITE:    last updated or revised: 08/09/98, 10/10/98
  7. WHATS NEW ON THE LATEST NONSENSE FROM NIST:    last updated or revised: 07/12/98
  8. WHATS NEW ON THE FQA vs SBA:    last updated or revised: 07/19/98
  9. WHATS NEW ON THE FQA vs DISC:    last updated or revised: 07/01/98
  10. WHATS NEW ON THE FQA vs TABD:    last updated or revised: 07/19/98
  11. WHATS NEW ON THE FQA QUESTIONS and ANSWERS FROM NIST:    last updated or revised: 07/08/98
  12. WHATS NEW ON FQA FORMS:    last updated or revised: 06/04/98
  13. WHATS NEW ON THE FQA LAW and REGULATIONS:    last updated or revised: 11/10/98
  14. WHATS NEW ON THE FQA OMB EXEMPTIONS:    This interesting info has a bit of age on it, but we just discovered it. last updated or revised: 07/19/98
  15. CLICK HERE for the P.L. 105-234 history and time line . We have moved the text in order to reduce the page size and loading time for this page.    last updated or revised: 03/06/99
  16. WHATS NEW ON SUBHAS MALGHAN:    last updated or revised: 08/19/98, 10/10/98. Contrary to some published rumors, Dr. Subhas Malghan will still be the responsible person at NIST for the FQA program management. His FQA responsibilities have not yet been given to anyone else.

WHAT'S ALSO HERE -- INDEX:
Just Click on the links below to go to the appropriate page section or linked page. Please use your back button to return to the prior page.
  1. FQA RELATED LINKS PAGE: A 'MUST SEE' page with MANY FQA LINKS:
  2. MINA PRESS RELEASES: updated 06/23/99
  3. MINA questions to NIST 4/26/98 page:
  4. 5/20/98 NIST Answers to MINA FQA questions sent on 4/26/98: A must read!
  5. MINA MEMBERSHIP APPLICATION via E-mail:
  6. MINA MEMBERSHIP APPLICATION:
  7. MINA Mailing List:
  8. MINA GUESTBOOK: Add your name and comments on the FQA or MINA.
  9. MINA IN THE NEWS PAGE:
  10. FREE MINA LOGOS FOR GENERAL USAGE:
  11. HOW TO CONTACT YOUR LEGISLATOR:
  12. PUBLIC LAW TASK FORCE OPINION SURVEY FORM:
  13. MINA INFORMATION REQUEST/COMMENT FORM:
  14. MEETINGS THAT NIST HAS CANCELED OUT ON AFTER THEY WERE SCHEDULED:    last updated or revised: 07/01/98. There may be more of these that we are unaware of. Please advise us if NIST has canceled a scheduled meeting with you or your organization. We will post that information here.
COMING ATTRACTIONS
  1. MINA forms: Example: How to submit a question to the U.S. government.
    Note: the NIST preferred format for attachments is WORD 97.
  2. Results of some questions sent to NIST, NVLAP, BXA, etc.**
    NEW! **See the MINA questions and answers to NIST page:
  3. A listing of other organizations proposing changes to the FQA. Some that we know of are: U.S. CONGRESS, SBA, DISC, TABD, NFDA, MINA, PLTF, IFI, WTO, EIFI, FAA, FAC. Please advise us if you know of any more organizations proposing changes to the FQA.
  4. A Mailing list that you may join to keep abreast of MINA actions.
    NEW! **See the MINA Mailing List page:
  5. NEW! Automatic e-mail notification of updates to this page. See the registration box at the bottom of this page.
  6. MINA will be publishing the names and contacts of NIST approved labs that will do commercial work. This is partially completed. Update: This work has been suspended until there is final action on the 1999 FQA amendments.
Click here to see the July 7, 1998 NIST update to its list of answers on FASTENER QUALITY ACT QUESTIONS & ANSWERS (June 10, 1998 - Version 1.0.) Even NAFTA gets no consideration from this new NIST answer!
This is an excerpt (the purple text) from the updated NIST Q & A page.
"To certify NAFTA to allow fasteners to be imported from Canada under the exemption, the United States would have to enter into negotiations with Canada to develop "satisfactory arrangements" by which purchasers in the United States can readily gain access to original laboratory testing reports for such fasteners. Such negotiations could take a considerable length of time.

For a couple of years, MINA has been asking NIST about these free trade exemptions. We have never received a satisfactory answer from NIST on why they have not pursued this option.

The appropriate section of the regulation follows:
Under Section 7(b)(2)(A) of the Act, the requirement that the delivery of any shipment of fasteners to an importer be accompanied by an original laboratory testing report shall not apply in the case of fasteners imported into the United States "as products manufactured within a nation which is party to a congressionally-approved free trade agreement with the United States that is in effect, so long as the Secretary certifies that satisfactory arrangements have been reached by which purchasers within the United States can readily gain access to an original laboratory testing report for such fasteners." Section 280.13(b)(1) of the regulations requires that the Director of NIST publish this certification in the Federal Register.

updated 09/27/98, rev 10/10/98: . . . Summary of NIST approved labs that will accept commercial work. As of 08/24/98 MINA had sent out 305 lab survey forms and had received back 158 replies. So far only 44 labs in the whole world (only 28 labs in the USA) will accept commercial work. Over 99% of the worlds countries and 74% of the states in the U.S. (100% of U.S. territories and possessions) have no FQA certified labs for commercial work. We have not sent out any survey forms lately. We have been waiting for the NIST response to P.L. 105-234 so that we may include any more appropriate and up-to-date questions on the survey. Now that NIST has finally announced a response to P.L. 105-234 we can revise the survey and send it to the new labs.

updated 06/09/99:
NIST lab approval progress -- As of 06/04/99   Lab approvals according to the latest posting from NIST are now DOWN to a total of 442. A drop of 8 labs from their last update. We are now seeing the downward trend in the number of labs that could be expected with the FQA99 legislation. Remember that the FQA99 will delay the need for certified labs for two years, so we can expect this downward trend to continue for some time. As the the date for the certified lab implementation approaches we can expect that the lab totals will rise again. However the number of labs needed with FQA99 should be substantially reduced since many fewer fasteners are covered.
Only one additional country; Australia with 1 lab has been added in recent months. Many states and territories of the USA and most of the world still do not have even a single NIST FQA approved lab. Remember that NIST had projected an impossible number of 525 labs by May 1998. As we had predicting for several years, that when May 1999 is here, NIST will still not have reached that original goal of 525 labs. Just continues to show how far off their original numbers were. Also remember that only a small portion of the FQA approved labs will accept commercial work! Also the QS9000 approvals have apparently been slowed considerably, with no new companies added since October 1998.

This is the latest (updated 04/22/99) approved lab summary by country.

Country: U.S.A. 296   Country: JAPAN 75
Country: TAIWAN 33   Country: CANADA 18
Country: FRANCE 8   Country: GERMANY 9
Country: U.K. 6   Country: NETHERLANDS 3
Country: BRAZIL 2   Country: KOREA 2
Country: INDIA 3   Country: ITALY 2
Country: FINLAND 2   Country: MEXICO 1
Country: AUSTRIA 1   Country: INDONESIA 1
Country: AUSTRALIA 1     .
Country: SWITZERLAND 3   TOTALS: 466
Click here for a USA state by state and USA territory breakdown.
Note that 75% of all the labs in the USA are concentrated in just 6 states. Certainly this geographical distribution will contribute to higher transportation costs and extra time needed for testing lab samples for those customers not located near the labs.

Laboratory geographical distribution by world regions
Region: NORTH AMERICA 314   Region: FAR EAST 114
Region: WESTERN EUROPE 34   Region: SOUTH AMERICA 2
Region: EASTERN EUROPE 0   Region: CENTRAL AMERICA 1
Region: MIDDLE EAST 0   Region: AFRICA 0
Region: CARIBBEAN 0   Region: ARCTIC/ANTARCTICA 0
Region: AUSTRALIA/OCEANIA 1   TOTALS: 466

 
[See the MINA lab survey summary (7/20/98 version).]


updated 06/21/98:
It is very obvious that there will NOT be anywhere enough commercial labs approved by July 26, 1998 to do the expected volume of FQA testing. Hopefully, NIST will now realize this and grant a further realistic extension of the implementation date (that means at least six months to a year). At this rate of lab certification it may take an additional year to get enough commercial labs approved. That assumes that there will even be enough companies interested in doing commercial work. Remember that even if a lab will accept your commercial work, they must be approved to do the exact tests that your fastener standard requires. This means that the real number of commercial labs is actually much smaller than the totals reflect. You will probably have to use more than one lab just to cover all the tests for a given lot of product. What happens if there is not any further interest from the business community in getting more labs FQA approved? Except for manufacturers with their own FQA approved labs (and there are not very many of them), will we be limited to just these few commercial labs trying to certify the whole worlds FQA fastener production?

updated 06/27/98 -- NIST's announcement on 06/24/98 grants a 90 day delay until October 25, 1998 (a little more realistic than the impossible prior 60 delay). This should give the Senate enough time to work on their version of the FQA amendments. Stay tuned.
September 28, 1998:
Federal Register Notice on P.L.105-234   09/28/98 The Director of NIST, under authority delegated by the Secretary of Commerce, and pursuant to Pub. L. 105-234, is postponing the effect of the Fastener Quality regulation by extending its implementation date until June 1, 1999. As a service to the public, those wishing to seek registration or accreditation, or record fastener insignia may continue to do so on a purely voluntary basis under the procedures set out in the regulation.


NIST projected that they expect only 10 responses to the first 07/15/98 notice and 50 responses to the second 07/15/98 notice. Not a surprising projection when they do not publish this information on their own FQA website. Both notices published on 07/15/98 have a comment period that ends September 14, 1998 so there is still time to respond.
The first 07/15/98 notice is for Paperwork Reduction Act comments on the Quality Act--Laboratory Accreditation Body Approval and Registrar Accreditation Body Approval.
The second 07/15/98 notice is for Paperwork Reduction Act comments on the Quality Act--Provisional Listing of Facilities.

Also there was a second FQA correction notice (2)  posted on 08/5/98 for the June 30, 1998 FQA Final rules.
"Summary: In the June 30, 1998 Federal Register notice announcing the final rule and extension of implementation date for the Fastener Quality Act, important information was inadvertently omitted from one of the amendments, which has created ambiguity in the final rule. Accordingly, the Director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is publishing this notice to correct that amendment."
Note: this was NIST's second attempt to get it right. Their first FQA correction notice (1)  posted on 07/9/98 also concerned the June 30, 1998 Federal Register.

Rumor update 06/21/98 -- From 'Fastener Industry News' -- June 8, 1998: Staffers from the office of Congressman Denny Hastert (IL) met with Secretary of Commerce William Daley about the FQA, Daley indicated that he would NOT exercise his executive authority to delay the implementation date. This means congress needs to act before July 26, 1998.
Remember MINA still needs more members in order to help oversee and control any unnecessary NIST regulation of FQA99. The more voices that we represent, the louder we are heard!

The latest official NIST information on the FQA is published on the OFFICIAL U.S. GOVERNMENT FQA WEB SITE. (caution: there is sometimes erroneous and outdated information posted on the NIST website)

Press notice: You are welcome to freely use any MINA materials. Just credit MINA as the source. Be advised that any communications from MINA should not be taken as legal advice.

CONTACTS AT: METRIC IMPORTERS OF NORTH AMERICA
[ e-mail to BONNIE CARTER c/o MINA ] [ e-mail to LEE SACKS c/o MINA ] [ e-mail to webmaster ]

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