6.1.2 The inspection body shall employ, or have contracts with, a sufficient number of persons with the required competencies, including, where needed, the ability to make professional judgements, to perform the type, range and volume of its inspection activities.
Current ILAC P-15:2020 requires:
5.2.5 n1 In order to be considered as “available”, the person shall be either employed or otherwise contracted.
6.1.2 n1 All requirements of ISO/IEC 17020 apply equally for both employed and contracted persons.
The question is: is it possible to contract inspectors through an employing company?
March 2014
Employing personnel shall be related to particular personnel. Mixing up with subcontracting shall be avoided.
ISO/IEC 17020:2012, Clause 6.3.1, NOTE 3 Where the inspection body engages individuals or employees of other organizations to provide additional resources or expertise, these individuals are not considered to be subcontractors provided they are formally contracted to operate under the inspection body’s management system (see 6.1.2).
The requirement of the standard (“The inspection body shall employ, or have contracts with, a sufficient number of persons”.) can be achieved by a contract via an employing company, if the contract ensures at least:
- the access to a particular inspector and his sufficient availability
- that the contract ensures clearly that the inspector will work under the inspection body management system.
- the control (education, training, monitoring – the “competence management”) is by the contracting inspection body.
- confidentiality and obligation to announce conflicts of interest to the inspection body.