Lloyd's Register Quality Assurance
(LRQA) has been accredited as the first certification body to make the
transition under United Kingdom Accreditation Service (UKAS) to ISO/IEC
17021 accreditation on a global level. ISO/IEC 17021 is the
International Standards Organization (ISO) standard which gives the
requirements for certification bodies delivering all types of management
system certification. LRQA is the only certification body to be awarded
ISO/IEC 17021 accreditation by the United Kingdom Accreditation Service
(UKAS) for all three management system products: QMS (ISO
9001), EMS (ISO
14001) and OHSAS (OHSAS
18001) for all industry sector scopes. The new standard requires
changes to the ways in which assessments are to be performed by
certification bodies.
Jenny Butler, Corporate Quality Manager for LRQA, said, “LRQA
was the first certification body to be accredited by UKAS back in 1986,
receiving registration number 001. We are proud that, 22 years later,
LRQA is still leading the way as the first global certification body to
achieve this higher standard of accreditation for the three main types
of management system certification covering all industry and business
sectors.”
Accreditation places rigorous requirements for competence and
impartiality on the bodies that offer audit and certification to
management system standards like ISO
9001:2000 (quality management), OHSAS
18001: 2007 (health & safety) and ISO
14001:2004 (environmental management). ISO/IEC 17021 replaces and
improves on two separate documents, ISO/IEC Guide 62:1996 and ISO/IEC
Guide 66:1996.
There are two major changes which will impact organizations with
certified quality and environmental management systems:
ISO/IEC 17021 strengthens the requirement on certification bodies for
a three year certification cycle with a recertification audit,
including a new requirement that the recertification audit and the
decision on issuing the new certificate must be performed prior to the
expiry of the existing certificate.
ISO/IEC 17021 also introduces a new requirement with regards to the
way in which “Minor Nonconformities”
(minor deficiencies present in a management system that is being
audited) are addressed during the certification process. Under the new
requirement, certification bodies are not allowed to issue a
certificate to an organization where Minor Nonconformities have been
raised until it has reviewed and accepted the organization’s
plan to correct the issue in question.
The International Accreditation Forum (IAF), in consultation with ISO,
has set the date for implementation of ISO/IEC 17021 as 15 September
2008.
Within the North American market, LRQA Inc. is currently in the final
stages of receiving ISO/IEC 17021 accreditation by the American ANSI-ASQ
National Accreditation Board (ANAB), the Standard Council of Canada
(SCC), and the Mexican accreditation entity Entidad Mexicana de
Acreditacion (ema).
For further information on the new ISO/IEC 17021 standard, please visit
us at www.lrqausa.com/iso17021.aspx
or contact us at operations-usa@lrqa.com.
Ends
NOTES TO EDITORS
1. LRQA (Lloyd's Register Quality Assurance), is a leading globally
accredited business assurance provider, delivering verification,
certification and training services to a wide range of organizations
around the world. LRQA has issued thousands of global approvals in areas
including environmental, quality, sustainability, health and safety,
supply chain assurance and security.
2. Lloyd’s Register is an independent risk
management organization. The Lloyd’s Register
Group works to help improve its clients’
quality, safety, environmental and business performance throughout the
world, because life matters.
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