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Appendix One: Glossary
35
- Accreditation
- The formal verification of an organisation's competence to carry out a specific conformity assessment function.
- Calibration
- A set of operations that establish, under specified conditions, the relationship between values of quantities indicated by a measuring system, or values represented by a material measure or a reference material, and the corresponding values realised by standards.
- Conformity
- Fulfilment by a product, process or service of specified requirements.
- Conformity assessment
- The term "conformity assessment" is a general term which covers a range of activities. It is generally accepted that "conformity assessment" is the "demonstration that specified requirements relating to a product, process, system, person or body are fulfilled".36 It covers testing, inspection and certification. Suppliers' declarations of conformity are sometimes included in the definition.
- Certification
- There are two differing types of certification: see Product certification and Systems certification.
- Inspection
- A form of conformity assessment that relies on visual evaluation and the subjective professional judgement of the assessor, accompanied where necessary by measurement and testing, to determine the characteristics of a product, process, system, person or body.
- Licences/Approvals/Registrations
- Regulators frequently require suppliers to obtain their approval or to register products before placing them on the market. To obtain approvals the manufacturer or supplier is usually required to present test reports, inspection reports and/or certificates. Acquiring an approval may also entail the regulator ensuring that the test reports and certifications cover all the requirements of the relevant regulations. Confusion over terminology may occur because these approvals are sometimes called "certification".
- Measurement
- A set of operations having the object of determining a value of a quantity.
- Metrology
- The science of measurement. There are two branches of metrology: legal metrology deals with settling legal requirements for measurement and physical metrology provides national measurement standards and tests measuring and calibration equipment. The correct calibration of equipment underpins all other forms of conformity assessment.
- Product certification
- Certification bodies may assess products against a specific standard or regulation and issue a formal attestation in the form of a certificate (or the right to use a certification mark) indicating that the product meets the requirements of the standard or regulation. Certification bodies utilise testing, inspection and an evaluation of the producer's quality management system (see below), or any combination of these, to assess samples of the product.
- Scope of accreditation
- A document that defines the range of activity, subject, or topic for which an accredited body is recognized.
- Standards
- Agreed technical specifications for products, processes, performances or services. Usually standards are voluntary but when referenced in legislation (often as mandatory requirements), they are referred to as technical regulations.
- Suppliers Declaration of Conformity
- Procedure by which a supplier gives written assurance that a product, process or service conforms to specified requirements. Rather than requiring products to obtain government approval before sale, a regulator may consider that it is more appropriate for a manufacturer or supplier to give a written assurance, based either on their own or a third party's testing or inspection, that their product or service conforms to specified requirements.
- Systems certification
- In addition to certifying products, a number of certification bodies also assess the quality management or environmental management systems of an organisation in accordance with the ISO 9000 or ISO 14000 series of management system standards. A quality management system is expected to reduce production errors, especially in high-volume production.
- Test
- Technical operation that consists of the determination of one or more characteristics of a given product, process or service according to a specified procedure. Testing usually involves following a defined procedure and reporting the outcomes in an objective and scientific way.
- Third Party
- Person or body that is recognized as being independent of the parties involved, as concerns the issue in question.
- Traceability
- The property of the result of a measurement or the value of a standard whereby it can be related to stated references, usually national or international standards, through an unbroken chain of comparisons all having stated uncertainties.
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