Kenya - Apply for Accreditation of Inspection and Verification Body

Advertisement

Procedure

• The KENAS Inspection and Verification accreditation program, provides Inspection bodies and Verification conformity assessment bodies with a means of demonstrating to their customers their superior competence and professional excellence skills in executing inspection and verification mandates in conformance to ISO/IEC 17020 international standard. This accreditation service is available to all inspection and verification services including in-house and independent services, from one-person operations to large-scale inspection and verification bodies.
  

Apply In-Person

1. The applicant has to submit his/her accreditation enquiry to a Kenya Accreditation Service (KENAS) Staff. This can be either through telephone, email or visiting KENAS offices. Contact information of KENAS can be obtained in our “office and contact “ information section of this page or through the following link
2. This is followed by a formal response by KENAS Officer on the terms and conditions applicable to provision of accreditation services.
3. The applicant should submit the duly filled and signed formal application. The application from can be obtained from KENAS Offices or downloaded from their website through the following link. You submit the application form with all the required documents.
4. This is followed by review of the application including support documents provided by the applicant.( desk assessment /document review)
5. After review, there is a formal response to the applicant regarding the outcome of the review of the application and documentation.
6. This is followed by an on-site assessment visit. Corrective Action Requests will be made to the applicant for review.
7. Follow up assessment of the client is done to determine effective implementation of the corrective action requires (CAR’s) raised.
8. An independent accreditation commitee will then make a formal accreditation decision as outcome and/or report of the assessment.
9. After this a formal communication will be made to the applicant on the decision made.
10. Upon a successful assessment. The applicant will be issued with an accreditation certificate.
11. Periodical surveillance assessments are done of the accredited conformity assessment body.

Advertisement

Required Documents

1. Application form
2. Cross reference matrix of internal documents against the normative standard
3. Quality Manual
4. Operating Procedures/ Methods
5. Evidence of PT / ILC
6. Application Fee paid

Office Locations & Contacts

Kenya Accreditation Service (KENAS) - Head Office
Embankment Plaza, 2nd floor,
Longonot Road, Upper Hill
P. O. Box 47400 - 00100 Nairobi
Telephone: +254 725 227 640
Fax: +254 787 395679
Email: [email protected]
Contact details.

Eligibility

• This accreditation service is available to all inspection and verification services including in-house and independent services, from one-person operations to large-scale inspection and verification bodies.

Fees

• Gazetted Fees

FIRST SCHEDULE Assessment fees

• Application - KShs. 40,000
• Document Review - KShs.95, 000
• Assessment (initial) - KShs. 250,000
  

Second Schedule Other Charges

• Pre-assessment - KShs.50,000
• Additional Assessor per day - KShs.60,000
• Application for Extension (all inclusive, except for VAT) - KShs. 250,000
• Review of re-submitted Documents - KShs. 45,000
  

Third Schedule Annual fees

• Annual Accreditation Fee - KShs.192,500
  

NOTE:

• Any fee charged shall be subject to value added tax.
• The assessment fee has taken into account one assessor unit for two days.
• The assessor unit consists of one lead assessor, a technical expert/assessor and Kenya Accreditation Service support required to facilitate the assessment. For complex assessment or wider scopes, the additional assessor/expert shall be charged based on the rate indicated on other charges.
• These fees do not cover the cost of travel and accommodation outside Nairobi. The fees shall be borne by the client in the event that there are no established assessors within the region or location.
• The Kenya Accreditation Service shall retain as penalty ten percent in value of accreditation assessments that are cancelled less than five days to the assessment date.

Validity

• Accreditation is valid for a period of one year.

Documents to Use

• Application Form for Accreditation

Sample Documents

Please attach sample completed documents that would help other people.

Processing Time

• Feedback on receipt of an application is within 5 working days.
• Processing of application is done within Sixty (60 days)
• Refer to the service charter through this link

Related Videos

Videos explaining the procedure or to fill the applications. 
Attach videos using the following tag <&video type='website'>video ID|width|height<&/video&> from external websites. 	
Please remove the '&' inside the tags during implementation.
Website = allocine, blip, dailymotion, facebook, gametrailers, googlevideo, html5, metacafe, myspace, revver, 
sevenload, viddler, vimeo, youku, youtube
width = 560, height = 340, Video ID = Can be obtained from the URL of webpage where the video is displayed.
e.g In the following url 'http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0US7oR_t3M' Video ID is 'Y0US7oR_t3M'.

Instructions

Please provide other instructions related to the certificate/documents.
e.g. The state office holds birth records since january 1908.

Required Information

• Contact details
  • Organization
  • Address (Physical)
  • Address (Postal)
  • Telephone
  • Email
  • Website
  • Contact person
  • Position within the organization
  • Type and Nature of business
  • If organization operate on several sites
• Organization details
  • The Legal Status of your organization
  • Total Number of Staff
  • List the conformity Assessment Services offered
  • If your conformity Assessment activities are part of a larger organization
  • Other organization activities
• Scope of accreditation
• Declaration
• Signature

Need for the Document

• Accreditation is the independent evaluation of certification bodies against International Standards e.g. ISO/IEC 17021 to ensure their impartiality, competence, and consistency. Accreditation is based on the assessment visits to the certification body to evaluate how their functions are performed in practice and, also includes KENAS witnessing the certification body performing audits.
• Inspection is the examination of a product design, product, service, process or installation, to determine conformity with general or specified requirements. Inspection bodies must demonstrate, to an accreditation body, that they have the necessary competence to perform specified tasks before they can achieve accreditation.
• Inspection is an essential part of ensuring the operational safety of many items that the public use in their daily lives. Safety of food production is a prime example, as are cranes, boilers and pressure vessels used in the workplace. The competence of inspection services employed by local and national authorities and other organizations to ensure regulatory requirements are being met is often assured by accreditation.
• There is a close relationship between inspection, testing and measurement. Inspection involves examinations by competent personnel using techniques including:

1. Visual examination
2. Visual comparison with standards (e.g. colour matching)
3. Dimensional checks
4. Examination using gauges and instruments.

• Examples of activities which benefit from accreditation include inspection of pressure equipment, cranes and passenger ropeways, inspection of offshore structures for oil and gas exploration and production, mechanical equipment inspection, non-destructive testing, inspection of meat, dairy products and other food production, bio-security and border control inspections, to name a few.

Information which might help

• Accreditation is a formal third party confirmation that Conformity Assessment Bodies (CABs) are competent to carry out specific conformity assessment activities. Conformity Assessment Bodies are those bodies that assess the compliance and or conformance of products, services and suppliers to guided specifications and requirements e.g. Testing and Calibration Laboratories, Proficiency testing Laboratories, Inspection and verification bodies, Medical Laboratories, Certification bodies etc.
• Accreditation is distinct from certification because certification focuses on an organization overall compliance with systems and products standards rather than the technical competence which is what accreditation focuses on. Therefore accreditation becomes a formal recognition to the CABs that they are competent to carry out conformity assessment tasks.

• The KENAS Inspection and Verification accreditation program, provides Inspection bodies and Verification conformity assessment bodies with a means of demonstrating to their customers their superior competence and professional excellence skills in executing inspection and verification mandates in conformance to ISO/IEC 17020 international standard. This accreditation service is available to all inspection and verification services including in-house and independent services, from one-person operations to large-scale inspection and verification bodies.
  

Criteria and Guidance Documents

• ISO/IEC 17020 2012- Conformity assessment — Requirements for the operation of various types of bodies performing inspection. This standard can be purchased from National Standards Body.
• ILAC P15:07/2016 Application of ISO/IEC 17020:2012 for the Accreditation of Inspection Bodies– This document provides information for use by both accreditation bodies and inspection bodies on the application of ISO/IEC 17020.

Other uses of the Document/Certificate

Please explain what are other uses of obtaining this document/certificate.
e.g. Birth Certificate can be used as proof of identity.

External Links

• Accreditation Process
• Step by step Process
• Service Delivery Charter

Others

Benefits of Inspection Accreditation
1. Minimize risk

• Throughout the world today, businesses and customers seek reassurance that the products, materials or services they produce or purchase meet their expectations or conform to specific requirements. This often means that the items are inspected to determine their characteristics against a standard or a specification. For the manufacturer or supplier, choosing a technically competent inspection body minimizes the risk of producing or supplying a faulty product.
  

2. Avoid expensive re-inspection

• Inspecting products and materials can be expensive and time consuming. If the quality of the inspection is poor, the consequences can be expensive; as well as the need for re-inspection, if a product has failed to meet specifications or customer expectations, it may lead to product recalls, rework, litigation and reimbursement. If re-inspection is required, it is invariably damaging to the reputation of the supplier or manufacturer too. Choosing a technically competent inspection body minimizes the chance of additional inspection being required.
  

3. Enhance your customers’ confidence

• Confidence in a product is enhanced if clients know it has been thoroughly evaluated by an independent, competent inspection body. This is particularly so if a product supplier can demonstrate to their customers that the inspection body itself has been evaluated by a third party. Increasingly customers are relying on independent inspection evidence, rather than simply accepting a supplier’s word that the product is “fit for purpose”.
  

4. Reduce costs and improve acceptance of goods internationally

• Through the KENAS Inspection accreditation, technically competent, accredited inspection bodies receive international recognition, which allows their inspection reports to be more readily accepted in other economies. This recognition helps to reduce costs for manufacturers and exporters by reducing or eliminating the need for additional inspection in the importing economy