According to Eileen O’Connor of Grant Thornton LLP, an accounting and management consulting firm, companies can write off ISO 9000 costs, but not all in one year. During recent tax examinations of two unrelated companies, the IRS offered to permit expense deductions for ISO 9000 certification over a three-year period. O’Connor says these decisions indicate that the IRS views the costs of process improvements as capital investments that must be amortized over several years, which is consistent with an earlier decision relating to just-in-time (JIT) process improvements. (The company in the JIT case appealed and negotiated a reduced amortization period. Maybe companies implementing ISO 9000 can do the same.)
Based on a report in Engineer’s Digest
