Calculating Landed Cost Crossover between Flying Probe and Fixture Tooling
Landed cost crossover balances fixture NRE against probe runtime fees, shifting financial advantage to fixtures once batch volume savings offset tooling costs.
Board Escape Penalty
Contractual Penalty
Contractual charges levied by an original equipment manufacturer against an electronic manufacturing services provider represent the financial consequence of shipping assemblies that fail to meet specified quality standards. In transactional agreements, this board escape penalty represents the direct transfer of costs associated with sorting or reworking defective circuit boards that bypassed the manufacturing line’s inspection gates. The penalty is calculated per escaped defect and often increases if the escape causes system-level failures at subsequent integration stages, providing a strong incentive for suppliers to maintain rigorous testing protocols.
Calculation Method
Inspection audits at the point of receipt provide the primary evidence for calculating the charge. A typical board escape penalty is calculated by multiplying the number of escaped defective boards by a contractually agreed multiplier of the assembly unit cost.
Operational Boundary
Acceptance thresholds defined in IPC standards limit the application of these charges. The board escape penalty does not apply to defect categories that are explicitly excluded by assembly agreements, such as those caused by component aging or internal board fab flaws. Quality inspectors must complete testing within a specified window of time, usually thirty days from receipt, to validly assert a claim under this provision.