The European cooperation for Accreditation (EA) has recently published a new document to facilitate a harmonized approach for accreditation of certification bodies providing certification of Occupational Health and Safety management systems (OHSMS).
The document entitled “EA – 3/13 EA Document on the Application of ISO/IEC 17021-1 for the Certification of Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems (OH&SMS” is mandatory for the consistent application of ISO/IEC 17021-1:2015 for the accreditation of certification bodies providing certification of Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems (OH&SMS). All clauses and Annexes of ISO/IEC 17021-1:2015 continue to apply and the document does not supersede any of the requirements of that standard.
The document does not apply only to OHSAS 18001 certification but can be used for other OH&SMS certification, such as ISO 45001, which is under development for publication in 2017 and other standards.
Additionally, it should be noted that this mandatory document applies to members of the European cooperation for Accreditation only & so does not have global acceptance through the International Accreditation Forum (IAF). A listing of EA members can be found here.
Appendix A of the document is a step to plug a temporary gap in the competence requirements for OHSMS Auditors until the publication of ISO/IEC 17021-10, which will provide the competence requirements for auditing and certification of occupational health and safety management systems.
Additional normative Appendices cover audit duration, legal compliance, scopes of accreditation and witnessing activities.
A copy of EA 3/13 M:2016, which has an application date of 20 June 2019, can be downloaded freely here