develop consensus standards for use by TNI's programs. This group has a support role in assisting other programs with activities such as guidance and standards interpretation.
fosters the generation of data of known and documented quality is through the National Environmental Laboratory Accreditation Program, or NELAP. The purpose of this program is to establish and implement a program for the accreditation of environmental laboratories.
is to establish and maintain a national PT program to support TNI’s National Environmental Laboratory Accreditation Program, and other activities.
Field Activities Program (NEFAP) Executive Committee is to establish and implement an accreditation program for field sampling and measurement organizations (FSMOs).
Audit Sample Program is to develop consensus standards for the manufacture and analysis of audit samples for source emission testing.
on a variety of topics of interest to the environmental measurement community. TNI also hosts two regularly scheduled meetings per year, typically in January and August. Both are a week long and involve open meetings of TNI committees as well as training courses and other special sessions.Standard Interpretation
Standard: 2009 TNI
Section: V2M1 (7.7.2-7.7.3) and V2M3 (6.13.2)
REQUEST:
According to 7.7.2: "The accreditation body shall establish procedures and plans for carrying out periodic surveillance onsite assessments, other surveillance activities and reassessments at sufficiently close intervals to monitor the continued fulfillment by the accredited CAB of the requirements for accreditation."
This implies surveilance onsite assessments are required. There is no "and/or" in the paragraph.
From 7.7.3 "Accreditation bodies shall rely on either reassessment alone or a combination of reassessment and surveillance, as follows: a) if based on reassessment alone, then the reassessment shall take place at intervals not exceeding 2 years; or
This implies AB can just do reassessments only and on site surveilances is not mandatory.
From 6.13.2 has the same verbiage as V2M1 7.7.2 followed by "Clause 7.11.3 is not applicable."
ISO Clause 7.11.3 = TNI V2M1 7.7.3 (see above) making it void. Since the only section I find that makes surveilance onsite assessments optional is voided, it appears that they are a requirement.
I don't believe that was the intent, however based on the language, I am not seeing where ABs can avoid onsites surveilance in addition to reassessments. With the ABs already having difficulty with reassessments, this will not help the cause.
Hopefully I am missing something.
Thank you.
TNI FINAL RESPONSE:
(LAB Expert Committee and NELAP AC, 9-7-13)
The governing TNI Standard for determining the frequency of assessments is V2M3, 6.13.3:
After an initial assessment for accreditation, accreditation bodies shall perform reassessments at intervals of two years plus or minus six months.
V2M1, 7.7.2 states that:
The accreditation body shall establish procedures and plans for carrying out periodic surveillance on-site assessments, other surveillance activities and reassessments at sufficiently close intervals to monitor the continued fulfillment by the accredited CAB of the requirements for accreditation.
When an AB establishes plans for assessments this TNI Standard makes it permissible to rely solely on reassessments at every two years plus or minus six months. There is no requirement in the standard that surveillance assessments, surveillance activities and reassessments must be used for every CAB. The requirement is that the AB must establish an effective plan for each CAB in order to assess that the CAB is meeting accreditation requirements.
Additionally, V2M3, 6.13.3 states that:
Once a CAB is accredited, accreditation bodies reserve the right to assess a CAB at any time during the accreditation period.
If an AB finds the need to conduct a surveillance assessment between reassessments it is consistent with the TNI Standards as long as reassessments occur every two years plus or minus six months.