MDR and ITP: what goes in a handover pack and how to build it as you go

The ITP is a contract about who checks what, and when

An Inspection and Test Plan lists each activity in fabrication order, and for each one names the acceptance standard, the record that will be produced, and the parties involved. Its most important content is the intervention points, because those are the only places where a third party can stop work.

A hold point blocks progress until the nominated party releases it, so missing one is not a paperwork issue but a rework risk: the work may have to be exposed again or redone. A witness point invites attendance but does not block, provided notice was given. Getting these two confused is one of the most expensive misunderstandings in fabrication QA.

• Activity, in fabrication sequence
• Acceptance standard and criteria for that activity
• Responsible party: fabricator, client, third party inspector, certifying authority
• Intervention type: hold point, witness point, surveillance or review
• The record that will be generated as evidence

What an MDR actually contains

The exact index is set by the contract, but the substance is consistent across structural, pressure and coating work: traceability from material to finished item, and evidence that every activity in the ITP was done and accepted.

• Material test certificates (MTCs), traceable to the heat and cast numbers used
• Welding procedure specifications and their supporting procedure qualification records
• Welder qualification records covering every welder who worked on the job, valid at the time of welding
• Weld register or weld map linking each weld to a joint, a procedure and a welder
• NDT reports and the NDT operator certifications behind them
• Welding inspection reports and non conformance reports with their dispositions
• Coating inspection records including environmental conditions and dry film thickness
• Pressure test, PWHT charts and dimensional or as built records where applicable
• The signed ITP itself, showing each point signed off

Why end of job compilation is the real problem

The records in an MDR are produced weeks or months apart by different people. When they are stored as loose files and only assembled at handover, three predictable failures show up together: welder qualifications that had lapsed by the time the weld was made, welds referencing a WPS revision that was superseded, and NDT reports that cannot be matched to a weld number.

All three are discoverable at the time the record is created and nearly impossible to fix at handover, because the evidence window has closed. The fix is structural rather than administrative: bind each record to the job, the weld and the procedure revision at the moment it is created.

How ForgeQM builds the pack during the job

ForgeQM organises work as Clients, then Projects, then Jobs and Areas, and the QA records attach to that structure as they are created rather than being filed afterwards. The weld register, drawings and weld mapping, ITP, test packs, surveillance records and the MDR compile and issue step all sit inside the job area.

Because procedures, welder qualifications and inspection reports are the same records the shop already works from, the MDR is a view over live data rather than a folder that has to be rebuilt. Some parts of the chain are still manual: compiling NDT report packs back into a pass or fail against the weld register is planned rather than implemented, so that reconciliation is currently done by the QA coordinator.