Draft report of the EGOLF TC4 meeting (Accreditation, Inspection and Certification)held on 25th March 2015 at CSI S.p.A., Viale Lombardia 20, 20021 Bollate (MI), Italy

1Opening of the meeting

Gert van den Berg, the TC4 chair, welcomed members andexpressed his appreciation to CSI S.p.A. for hosting this week of EGOLF meetings in Bollate.

2To approve the draft agenda, N269rev2

The agenda was approved.

3To approve report of the previous meeting held on 14th October 2014, N268

The report of last meeting was approved.

4Matters arising not dealt with elsewhere on agenda

-General course for new staff, N270

Members interested in offering this course internally to their staff may request a PDF copy of the course material from the Secretary General (SG). This material comprises 161 slides which provide comprehensive coverage of European systems for testing, classification and certification. The material was developed by Paul Vandevelde. The SG will keep a record of requests so thatusage may be monitored in future.

Action EGOLF Plenary contacts

The heat transfer part of general course for new laboratory staff is too complex to be delivered in a Powerpoint presentation. Members agreed that it would be preferable to offer this through e-training and to employ an appropriate IT expert to develop this form of course delivery. Reference was made to the EU funding programme ERASMUS+ . It was noted that RIFS in Bulgaria had been preparing a project application under this programme and may have information to share. The SG also has experience of a continuous professional development (CPD) training project under the previous Leonardo da Vinci programme. Sebastian Ukleja of CTO offered to help investigate ERASMUS+ on behalf of EGOLF.

Action S Ukleja/SG

-EGOLF harmonization courses and internal trainees

As defined in the EGOLF Course Guidelines, trainees are encouraged to use the course material and organise internal courses for colleagues in their own lab., provided that the original course provider considers that they have understood the course content well. Material is made available to participants in PDF format. If a member lab. wishes to offer such a course in another language, they can translate the course material for internal use only.

A question was raised about the procedure for member labs., other than those such as SP and MPA NRW which had developed harmonization courses, to present a course in their own language to other EGOLF members i.e. not restricted to internal use. The SG will discuss this with Executive prior to consultation with existing course developers.

Action SG

The following comments were made:

  • course development costs are not always fully covered by the EGOLF contribution and so the developer has to present courses before the investment is recouped
  • there should be an opportunity to offer "old" harmonization courses for translation and presentation in other countries; this is a way of spreading best practice
  • attendance numbers would improve if courses were offered in other languages

-Manual for planning and performing round robins

Rupert Ehrlenspiel, Chair TC1 has pointed out that a sentence is needed with regard to presentation of individual results to national accreditation bodies. This is now captured in Chapter 5 (Ownership of results) of the Guidelines on the Publications folder on the EGOLF website.

5Steps to Excellence and Minimum Membership Requirements, N265rev4 and Pl N711

Members expressed strong concerns about those labs. which did not yet comply with EGOLF's minimum membership requirements. They emphasized that, if we are to have rules, these must be followed. Not only is it unfair on those members which comply but it also means increased costs for them (e.g. when labs. do not take part in a round robin test for which they are accredited, participating labs. are faced with higher costs). Suggestions included introducing the following sentence on round robin registration forms: "We assume you will participate unless you provide a good reason not to". The TC4 chairman was also asked to keep EA informed of annual EGOLF round robins.

Action G van den Berg

Following the most recent review captured in Plenary document N711, four labs. had still not replied to the minimum membership requirements questionnaire and so there was no basis for their membership certificates to be renewed. Likewise, the Steps to Excellence document N265rev4 had revealed that the percentage for compliance is 70% of the membership. This falls well below the 2014 target of 90% which had been set by TC4 in October 2013.

In conclusion, members called for Executive to define some rules and deadlines for compliance (or, if not, to reduce the rules) and suggested that direct contact be made with those labs. which had not complied to date, in order to find out the reason for this and to inform them about future sanctions and/or exclusion.

Actions Executive

6EGOLF test search database and access to member profiles, N271

Members endorsed the recommendation of Executive to remove the test search database from the EGOLF website.

Action SG

7Interactions with EA

EGOLF Technical Assessors

Although EA is not obliged to use the EGOLF list of technical assessors, the Chairman was asked to remind them about this list and to encourage them to use it. He agreed to inform them about the EGOLF SBI round robin at the same time.

Action G van den Berg

Request to extend EGOLF list to non-members

This request to include DANAK technical assessors on the EGOLF list was refused.

EA definition "scope of accreditation"

The SG has updated member profiles to ensure that activities listed there are only those for which a member has accreditation.

8Outcome of WG review: EGOLF Agreements and Recommendations, N272

At the last meeting of TC4, the Chairman had proposed that all Agreements and Recommendations be reviewed every five years commencing 2015. Philip Howard (BM Trada) and Stefan van de Wetering (SP) had now checked and proposed cross references to relevant test and product standards, with information about the current status of the documents. The SG has updated the EGRs with these references.

The TC4 Chairman agreed to provide appropriate text in those EGAs which are missing a reference to the relevant standards and to add a revision date to these documents. The SG will then upload these with document N272 to assist searching on the EGOLF website.

Actions G van den Berg/SG

The TC1 and TC2 Chairmen will also take a quick look at the documents listed in N272 before organizing task groupsto perform a phased review. The review will be to determine which documents are still relevant, which should be combined, withdrawn or updated to the latest version of a standard, which should be mandatory and, subject to clarification and definition of terminology by Executive, which should be considered Recommendations (EGRs), Agreements (EGAs), Resolutions or Position Papers (EGPs). The task groups are also advised to take into consideration related SH02 guidance on CIRCABC, since many position papers and previous recommendations were based on EGOLF guidance.

Action L Boström and R Ehrlenspiel

One suggestion from TC4 is that EGRs represented best practice at the time they were published. Another is that, if mandatory, an EGOLF document should be referred to on a lab.'s scope of accreditation and be subject to a resolution signed by the membership. It is of course essential that all members read these documents.

For note Executive

9EXAPS and TC4 meetings

The Chairman asked for thisitem to be removed from the agenda since EXAPs are being covered by TC2.

Action SG

10Any other business

No other business was reported.

11 Date of next meeting

- TSE, Istanbul on 14th October 2015.

- IBS, Linz on 27th April 2016

Chairman: Gert van den Bert
Country / Organisation / Name
Austria / IBS / Marcus Eichhorn-Gruber
MA 39
Belarus / RIFS / Anatoli Lushchyk
Veronika Kashankova
Belgium / ISSEP
LIEGE / Eric Wellens
Fabien Dumont
wfrgent / Edwin van Wesemael
Bulgaria / RIFS
Czech Republic / PAVUS / Jaroslav Dufek
Mirko Louma
Denmark / DBI / Christian B Andersen
Estonia / TUV Estonia / Fred Haas
Finland / VTT / Jyri Pekkanen
Markus Taipale
France / CERIB / Christophe Tessier
CSTB
Efectis France / Apologies
LNE
Germany / BAM / Sacha Hothan
Frank Klemmstein
DMT / Simon Ludaescher
MPA Uni. Stuttgart / Sabrina Heldele-Twietmeyer
MFPA LEIP / Michael Juknat
Nick Neumann
MPA Dresden GmbH / Thomas Beutner
MPA Bau HANN / Bernd Restorff
MPA B’WEIG / Gary Blume
MPA NRW / Hendrik Rademacher
P HOCH / Tina Zitzmann
TUM / Rupert Ehrlenspiel
Hungary / EMI / István Móder
Imre Juhász
Israel / SII / Apologies
Italy / CSI / Paolo Mele
I GIORD / Stefano Vasini
LAPI / David Borsini
RINA / Apologies
Latvia / MeKA / Edgars Buksans
Lithuania / FRC LITH / Donatas Lipinskas
Mindaugis Grigonis
Žydrūnas Kuodis
Netherlands / Efectis NL / Gert van den Berg
BDA
Peutz / Jacques Mertens
Norway / SP Fire Research AS / Heli Välimäki
Paul Halle Zahl Pedersen
Anne Steen-Hansen
Poland / CTO / Sebastian Ukleja
ITB / Marek Łukomski
Russia / VNIIPO / Aleksandr Strekalev
Elena Mikhaylova
Anatoly Makarevich
Sergei Seregin
Slovakia / FIRES / Štefan Rástocký
Dávid Šubert
Slovenia / ZAG / Nataša Knez
Spain
AITEX / Apologies
APPLUS-LGAI / Jordi Mirabent
GAIKER
LEITAT
TECNALIA
Sweden / SP Fire Technology / Lars Boström
Switzerland / EMPA / Thomas Nussbaumer
Swissi Process Safety
Turkey / Efectis ERA Avrasya / Ali Bayraktar
TSE / Metehan Çaliş
Ali Katirci
UAE / TBWIC
UK / BRE
BM Trada / Philip Howard
CFR / Stuart Plummer
Exova Warrington / Niall Rowan
FM Approvals / Richard Zammitt
USA / FM Approvals
Secretary General / Christine Roszykiewicz