Jordanian Accreditation System – Accreditation Unit (JAS-AU) is proud to announce that it has expanded its services to include accreditation of Proficiency Testing Providers (PTP) according to the requirements of ISO/IEC 17043 standard.

JAS-AU has been working diligently to expand its services in the field of accreditation of PTP since 2022. This is due to the importance of proficiency testing results and their use as a tool to demonstrate conformity assessment bodies’ (CABs) competence, in order to improve the national quality infrastructure. It also recognises the increasing demand of local PTPs to overcome the obstacles that CABs (laboratories specifically) face when participating with providers abroad. For example, shipping costs have recently increased, and increasing accreditation areas which it is difficult to cover by PTP, and the restrictions by the customs agency in all around countries.

Technical support for this project was provided by UNIDO, and an accreditation expert was involved in the project. Several activities took place according to a predefined plan as follows:

• Hosting a training course from 2 – 5 January 2023 that covered ISO/IEC 17043:2010 requirements (Technical & Management requirements) and the new revision of ISO/IEC 17043, Assessment techniques, and reporting. The course was attended by JAS-AU assessors and staff including personnel responsible for evaluating the outcome of assessments and of decision-making,
• Reviewing JAS-AU management system and preparing a gap analysis against the assessment criteria for the accreditation of PTP, and then making the necessary changes to the management system,
• Training on the new changes and on the preparation for mock assessment on 15 October 2023, and
• Two onsite assessments performed by JAS-AU assessment teams under observation of the expert from 16 – 19 October 2023. The assessments were performed on two PT providers who expressed their willingness to have a mock assessment within the project activities.

 

The desired goal of the visits, which was to evaluate the competence of JAS-AU and its assessment teams was achieved, as the technical expert expressed his satisfaction and praised the competence of the assessment team members, the extent of their commitment, and their ability to assess the requirements.

Consequently, JAS-AU has officially launched a new service to accredit PTP according to ISO/IEC 17043 and ILAC policies.

JAS-AU will continue to build on this achievement and prepare to apply for extending its signatory status of the Arab Accreditation Cooperation MLA (ARAC MLA) to cover the scope of accreditation of Proficiency Testing Providers. This will ultimately lead to the extension of its ILAC MRA signatory status.