evidence of inadequate performance by ISO 9000 registered organizations is readily available in everyone's daily professional and personal experience. In part this can be explained by the increasing demands for ISO registration by large end-user organizations, leading to a scramble for certification which is sometimes met by unjustified approvals by unqualified assessors. The US automotive industry's QS 9000 programme encourages use of ISO 9000, and contains measures to guard against "soft" approvals. Also, in the UK, steps are being taken by the accreditation service to reduce this abuse, but there is a legacy of misleading registrations here and elsewhere. More serious is the explanation that ISO 9000 approval can be quite properly obtained through satisfactory operation of a Quality Management System that does not measure market performance or new product development, nor provide the stimulus for continuous process improvement. These issues are dealt with in general, and by reference to a specific example of an SME studied over a four-year period.