COFRAC: French accreditation committee
In France, Cofrac is the only reference body in terms of accreditation: an activity of public power and of general interest.
The French Accreditation Committee (Cofrac) was created in 1994 on the initiative of the public authorities. We are a non-profit association, which has been entrusted with a public service mission: that of ensuring the competence and impartiality of conformity assessment bodies (CABs), generally referred to as « control ». In 2008, pursuant to a European regulation, the State designated Cofrac as the sole accreditation body in France.
For the independence and impartiality purpose, all the interests related to accreditation are represented within the decision-making bodies. Cofrac has set up several bodies, which represent 280 members in total:
- Executive Board and a General Assembly, whose members are organized into three distinct colleges:
- College A is made up of accredited organizations or the groups on which they depend. In other words, Cofrac customers
- College B is made up of professional groups of companies, people or structures representing buyers who use or may use the services of organizations in college A. In other words, the customers of our customers.
- College C is made up of representatives of the public interest, ensuring either a sovereign function or collective interests defense. In other words, the State, State agencies, national institutes, consumer, user or environmental protection associations.
WHAT IS ACCREDITATION?
Issued in France by Cofrac, accreditation is both the keystone and the first link in the trust chain.
When we carry out analyzes for our health, when we consume a product or a service… we want to be sure of the competence of the body that carried out the control! Cofrac accreditation recognizes and certifies the skills and inspection bodies impartiality at national or even international level.
In France, Cofrac is the only national body designated and recognized by the State to issue accreditations. This activity is therefore a matter for the public authorities. Each accreditation has a specific scope, i.e. a well-defined perimeter depending on the sector and/or the normative environment of the applicant organization.
Objective :
Minimize errors made on the COFRAC request
Delegate tasks to the team via meister task in order to properly organize the work
Reduce the burden on the service that processes the correction of COFRAC returns
Started the planning of COFRAC meetings
“Checked or certified once and recognized everywhere”: this is the goal sought by all economic players who want to limit the cost of trust without lowering its level. The accreditation process fits perfectly into this perspective thanks to the mutual recognition agreements established at the international level.
Through these agreements, the accreditation bodies recognize the certificates equivalence issued by their accredited with the certificates issued by the bodies accredited by their counterparts. Thus, for example and thanks to the agreements, it is no longer necessary for a product supplier to have its products certified in each country where it wishes to market them.
Accreditation International recognition therefore facilitates access to export markets. Recognition agreements exist for various conformity assessment activities (testing, calibration, inspection, product certification, etc.).
International recognition agreements which are of interest to France are drawn up and managed by 3 organisations:
This organization intervenes for the mutual recognition of accreditations, for laboratories, interlaboratory comparison organizations, producers of reference materials and inspection organizations, with a worldwide scope of recognition.
This global organization intervenes for the mutual recognition of accreditations of certification and verification bodies, with a global scope of recognition.
The European co-operation for Accreditation (EA)
This organization intervenes for the mutual recognition of accreditations for the same activities as ILAC and IAF, but with a European scope of recognition.
The prerequisite for the implementation of a mutual recognition agreement is the existence of a common frame of reference applicable to accredited bodies, i.e. identical operating requirements applying to them regardless of either the country.
An accreditation body can become a signatory to an agreement after having successfully undergone a peer review organized by EA, ILAC or IAF, according to identical operating requirements for all. This benchmark for the evaluation of accreditation bodies is mainly based on the international standard ISO/IEC 17011.
The accreditation bodies that have signed the agreements are then regularly reassessed on these same criteria to be maintained in the agreement.
These peer reviews are also an opportunity for constructive exchanges contributing to accreditation practices harmonization.
Many countries such as France have made commitments to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions in order to combat global warming.
The policies implemented in terms of energy efficiency and transition are part of this framework. They rely on reliable and effective tools such as accreditation to achieve the reduction targets set.
(((((SEE THE LINK))))): Efficiency and energy transition | COFRAC – French Accreditation Committee
The COFRAC agent must report to the person involved in the construction site (field sales representative, engineers, RGE, etc.) any anomaly in the client’s file, for example if something is missing from work photos (emergency button on the external units , labeled electrical panel, solar tank, thermodynamic tank, poor positioning of equipment, etc.)
If the file is correct, and nothing is missing, we move on to the COFRAC request stage:
The COFRAC request is made on the accredited body site which is able to carry out standardized energy saving operations inspections
Its accredited bodies are able to carry out standardized energy saving operations inspections as part of the system for issuing Energy Saving Certificates.
You will find the list of these organizations here: Home | COFRAC – French Accreditation Committee
In the context of work financed by CEEs, to find out if an inspection body should intervene on your premises, we invite you to contact the applicant for energy savings certificates (delegate or obliged) who is able to answer to this question. The delegates and obligors are the companies that have financed all or part of your work.
In our case (GENERALE ENERGIE), it is Elite quality inspection that inspects the sites: Home | COFRAC – French Accreditation Committee