What is ISO?
ISO stands for International Organization for Standardization; it is an independent, non-governmental organizational platform under the charter of United Nations and affiliated with WTO (World Trade Organization). Sole role of ISO is to develop & publish standards for the industry. So far more than 23000 standards have been published by ISO for different industries and technical sectors. Sector experts are hired by ISO and technical committees are formulated to develop or improve standards. ISO earns amounts for its day-to-day operations and payment to their experts from the publishing of these standards. So that’s why these standards are copy right documents and any company who want to have ISO standard, they can visit ISO store and purchase the required standard.
How to achieve ISO Certification?
When any company want to adopt any ISO Management System standard and want to demonstrate the compliance to that ISO Standard. They are purchasing ISO Standard from ISO Store and start developing management system related to that standard. If they have in-house expertise, they can use their own resources otherwise they can hire services of any good reputable ISO consultant to develop their system. After system development, your organization has to implement the system in the organization and make the improvements in the defined system.
When sufficient evidence of system implementation is achieved, organization has to approach to accredited certification body in their respective country to get them audited and certified against the required standard. Be aware, there are lot hoax certification mills who just sell the certificates in cheap amounts. This kind of fake certificate from ISO Certification mills who are accredited from so called independent accreditation bodies could cause a lot of embarrassment for your company along with financial losses. Make sure to get quotations only from ISO Certification bodies who are accredited from well reputed accreditation bodies and are MLA signatory with IAF (International Accreditation Forum).
For ISO Certification in UAE or ISO Certification in Dubai, your organization must for 3rd party independent certification body who is accredited from EIAC (Emirates International Accreditation Centre). This is a regulatory requirement in Dubai & UAE. Please review EIAC circular for more information.
Why your organization need to be ISO Certified?
When you want to show compliance to ISO standards to your customers and other stakeholders, you need to have third party independent accredited evaluator (ISO Certification Body) who can audit your company and issue you the ISO certificate. This Iso certificate will be an evidence that you had been audited by an independent 3rd party accredited certification body and your customers, suppliers and other stake holders can trust your system.
What is the purpose of ISO certification?
Following could be the reasons to get your company ISO Certified,
- Client Requirement: As per your clients purchasing policy requirements, you had to be ISO certified in applicable relevant standards
- Requirement to participate in Tenders: Sometimes it is a pre-requisite to participate in tenders that your company should be ISO certified. If you are not certified, possibly your company will be out of bidding competition.
- In-House Requirement: Sensible company owners not wait for somebody to tell them to be certified for ISO systems, they by themselves opting to go for their systems to be developed, implemented and certified by reputable certification bodies. As they know how important is to improve their systems and standardize them as per best practices defined in international standards.
- Marketing / Branding Requirement: When your company is ISO certified, you can use this as an advantage on your competitors by using your certification logos in your marketing plans. You can use your ISO Certification logo in following ways,
- Company front board
- Website
- Email Signature
- Company social media campaigns
- Letter head & other documents
- Product brochures
- Company vehicles
- Product packaging (On primary packaging, ISO Certification logo is not allowed as ISO certification is for company systems not for the products)
Which company is eligible for ISO Certification?
All ISO standards are generic in nature. They are not giving any specific, pin-point solutions. They talk in general about the requirements to be fulfilled, because specific requirements could be different in different countries and geographical areas. That is the reasons these ISO standards are applicable globally. Any company whatever size they have with whatever complexity of operations, can go for ISO certification of its systems.
How to identify applicable ISO Standards for a company?
ISO 9001:2015 Quality Management System, this is a basic, fundamental standard, which is also called mother of all standards, it is applicable to all sort of companies no matter what the size or complexity of operations.
ISO 14001:2015 Environmental Management System, this is standard for environment, if your organization is interacting with environment then definitely you need to go for this standard. However, if your organization is a trading company or a service company and you are not interacting with environment then this standard is not applicable on your company. Normally
ISO 45001:2018: Occupational Health & Safety Standard, this is standard for Health & Safety, if your organization has chances of accidents / injuries while working, and you want to your management system in a way that you can make sure that your employees must be safe while working, you must go for ISO 45001:2018 standard. Normally, companies related to manufacturing, construction, oil & gas they are opting to go for ISO 45001:2018 as they are facing more risk of injuries and safety issues with their workforce.
ISO 22000:2018 Food Safety Management System, this is standard for food safety. Any company in food supply chain they can go for this standard. This is Quality standard for companies in Food Supply chain. It is combination of ISO 9001:2015 and HACCP. Your company can choose to go for HACCP and ISO 9001:2015 separately or they can combine requirements of both ISO 9001:2015 & HACCP and go for certification against ISO 22000:2018.
HACCP: Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point, this is guideline standard for food safety based on codex Alimentarius. It give technical requirements for a food company to produce safe food. When we combine HACCP with ISO 9001:2015, it becomes ISO 22000:2018. HACCP is in built requirement of ISO 22000:2018. If your company has ISO 22000:2018 then there is no need to go for ISO 9001:2015 or HACCP. HACCP is based on General Principles Of Food Hygiene CAC/RCP 1-1969
ISO 22716:2007: This is guideline standard for Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP) for Perfumes & cosmetic companies who are involved in the manufacturing, packaging, testing, storage, and transportation of perfumes & cosmetics.
For ease of understanding, we had mentioned relevant ISO standards to their industrial sectors in below mentioned table,
| Industries | Applicable Standars |
|---|---|
| Manufacturing | ISO 9001,ISO 14001,ISO 45001,ISO50001(If its high energy usage company) |
| Manufacturing (Food) | ISO 9001,ISO 22000,HACCP,FSSC 22000,BRC,HALAL |
| General Trading | ISO 9001 |
| General Trading (Food) | ISO 22000 or ISO 9001+HACCP |
| Perfume & cosmetics | ISO 9001 & GMP (Normally), Halal,add ISO 14001, &ISO 45001 (for M & L size company), SEDEX |
| Construction | ISO 9001,ISO 14001,ISO 45001 |
| Oil & Gas | ISO 9001,ISO 14001,ISO 45001 |
| Packaging Industry | ISO 9001,ISO 14001,ISO 45001 |
| Packaging Industry (Food) | ISO 22000 or ISO 9001+HACCP |
| Service Industry | ISO 9001 or other sector specific standard |
| Textile / Garments Industry | ISO 9001,ISO 14001,ISO 45001, SEDEX |
| Facility Management | ISO 9001,ISO 14001,ISO 45001,ISO 41001 |
| Inspection Bodies | ISO 17020 Accreditation from EIAC |
| Laboratories (Testing / Calibration) | ISO 17025 Accreditation from EIAC |
Prominent Sector Specific ISO Standards:
There are some standards which are very specific to the industrial sectors. We had tried to identify in below mentioned table the type of companies or industrial sectors on which these offbeat standards are applicable. There are many more standards which are not very common, to find out details about these standards please click here.
| Off Beat Standard | Applicable Standars |
|---|---|
| ISO 50001 | Manufacturing Sector (for high energy usage companies) |
| HALAL | Food Manufacturing or trading companies who want to provide Halal food to consumers |
| FSSC 22000 | Food Manufacturing companies who are exporting (Special to Europe ) as FSSC 22000 is more acceptable globally |
| BRC | For Food Manufacturing companies who want to go next level to ISO 22000,HACCP or FSSC 22000 |
| ISO 41001 | For Facility Management Companies |
| ISO 27001 | For companies who are sensitive to information security |
| ISO 55001 | For companies who are sensitive to asset management |
| SEDEX SMETA | For companies who want to export to europe,Sedex Certification (Social compliance) is a requirement from European companiesto be complied |
| SA 8000 | For companies who want to export to Europe,Social accountability standard certification is a requirement from European companies to be complied |
| CTPAT | Custom Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (CTPAT) is a requirement for US Border security to comply with for Supply chain logistic companies |
| WRAP | Worldwide Responsible Accreditation Production (WRAP) |
| ISO 37001 | For companies who are sensitive to Anti Bribery Protocols |
Note: Please add below mentioned standard in above table
ISO 39001: Companies who are sensitive to Road Traffic Safety
Estimated cost to get ISO Certification?
When your organization will approach to certification body to send you the costing proposal. They need below mentioned information for the preparation of proposal,
- No of Staff: Total Staff, Management Staff, Workers
- No of working shifts
- Company location: Also mention branch details, if company have more than one location
- Activity of Work: This is usually mentioned in trade license of the company. From this activity of work, ISO Certification body had to identify the relevant NACE code & IAF Code to confirm that whether they have approval of that particular NACE code / IAF code from their Accreditation Body. If they are not approved, they can’t do audit of your company and you need to go for any other Certification Body who have approval of this NACE Code.
Based on above information, ISO Certification Body will calculate the man days involved as per the IAF guideline for man day calculation to do the audit of your company and send you the proposal.