It is a legal requirement for manufacturers of IECEx equipment to have the relevant quality assurance in place for their products.

For IECEx this is called a Quality Assessment Report (QAR).

The manufacturer must ensure compliance with the full requirements of IECEx operational document OD/005 and have an ISO 9001 compliant Quality Management System.

An audit (typically one day) will take place annually (under the terms of the IECEx rules) and CSA Group are equipped to conduct this, ensuring that you can declare full compliance to the directive and bring your product to market in as short a lead-time as possible. If the manufacturer holds an accredited ISO 9001 certificate from a certification body that holds a national accreditation (e.g UKAS, RAB, ANAB) and are a signatory of the IAF MLA, then the frequency of the audit may be changed to eighteen month periods.

CSA Group can also offer training and technical advice on the requirements and responsibilities of Quality Assurance. For more information, please see our Preliminary QA Assessment Section, or contact CSA Group for more details.