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When it comes to choosing a Certification Body, it's important to know that you are choosing one with proven credibility. Not only is it important that your certification is recognised by your clients, you'll also want to be sure your organisation gets the most out of implementing the standard.

 

Introducing accreditation

 

In the same way that you would be certified, a Certification Body should be properly accredited. Recognised accreditation means that a Certification Body has proven that their procedures are impartial and objective, that they have the required technical competence and that their performance is monitored to ensure they are fit to carry out certification services.

 

In theory then, by being accredited, this should give you peace of mind that the Certification Body is both trustworthy, impartial and provides a service of equal competence to any another accredited body.

 

In order to ensure equally high standards of certification across Europe, the European Commission for Enterprise and Industry set out a European-wide policy for accreditation. This ensures consistency in the accreditation market and is designed to protect the consumer. Accordingly, it is mandatory for every European member-state to have a single national Accreditation Body (NAB).

 

The United Kingdom Accreditation Service (UKAS)

 

The United Kingdom Accreditation Service (UKAS) is the UK Government's designated NAB. Officially, this is stated thus "UKAS is the sole National Accreditation Body recognised by Government to assess organisations that provide certification, testing, inspection and calibration services to internationally agreed standards."

 

UKAS is the national signatory, along with other nationally recognised accreditation bodies world-wide, to multilateral agreements for the purposes of mutual recognition through the European Co-operation for Accreditation (EA), the International Accreditation Forum (IAF) and the International Laboratory Accreditation Co-operation. All NABs are joint-signatories to these agreements and are therefore deemed to be equivalent having undergone stringent peer evaluations.

 

Other accreditation bodies

 

Despite UKAS being the sole recognised NAB in the UK, we are aware that there are other UK based accreditation bodies in existence. However, as they are not Government recognised, or listed on the International Accreditation Forum website, the question is, who are they regulated by?

 

According to the International Accreditation Forum, any accreditation bodies not listed by them tend to operate under their own rules and have no form of independent review or assessment. They have also found that such accreditation bodies don't have proven credibility.

 

It is not illegal to become an accreditation body or certification body without being assessed, however, in order to ensure your certification is recognised by all clients, the decision is simple. If you want proven credibility, choose a UKAS accredited Certification Body. This is particularly important if you are looking to tender for Government contracts, where it is policy to only accept certification from our the UK's National Accreditation Body, which is UKAS.

 

 

Consequences of not using a UKAS accredited body

 

The worst cases associated with non-UKAS accredited certification, were documented in a news article on the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB).  It reported that FSB members were being targeted by certification bodies which were offering low-cost deals. However, those members that 'bit' found that their certifications weren't accepted, because the certification was not backed with UKAS accreditation.

As we have found with our own clients, some have had their fingers badly burnt spending money on what has proved worthless certification. They have then had to spend more money achieving UKAS accredited certification with ourselves.

 

Although the FSB story was from 2005, they have been in active support of  UKAS accreditation since 2001.

 

 

Verifying accreditation

 

To check if a certification body is UKAS accredited, check their accreditation status on the UKAS website.

 

Three  key points

 

	Using a UKAS accredited certification body means they have been assessed to internationally recognised standards to demonstrate both competence and impartiality, therefore reducing the risk of selecting an incompetent certification body and paying for what could prove worthless certification.
	Using a UKAS accredited certification body means your ISO certification will be recognised by both local and central government; vital when tendering for contracts.
	Always question a certification body's accreditation status, and find out who regulates the accreditation body if they are not UKAS. Remember, there is only one National Accreditation Body (NAB) for each European member state.

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