Features of Calibration Management Software

March 5, 2009
CMS Offerings

While no single software package does everything, CMS offerings on the market offer most of these features.

  • Help instrument maintenance supervisors create and store calibration procedures and associate them with one or more devices that share procedures.  
  • Control calibration schedules, issuing work orders and alerts when a test is due.
  • Email scheduled and unscheduled actions based on deviations and approval alerts to designated personnel.
  • Download test procedures and as-left data to calibrators before calibration.
  • Automate procedures to walk the technician through a calibration step by step. 
  • Record and upload as-left results when a calibration is complete and upload or import data from the calibrator.
  • Generate documentation, such as calibration certificates (i.e., ISO 17025) and audit trails for electronic validation requirements; i.e., FDA 21 CFR Part 11, Electronic Records and Signatures.
  • Provide supervisory approval of uploaded data and identify when NIST-certified sensors need a recertification.
  • Provide database searches of instruments, vendors, loop diagram/tag relationships and records for each tag, arranged by work or control system zones.
  • Compare calibration data across multiple calibrations.
  • Offer synchronization of laptops used independently of the network. 
  • Interface to higher-level instrument management software, automation systems plant asset maintenance (PAM) applications, site-wide computerized maintenance management systems (CMMSs) or enterprise asset management (EAM).