DO YOU KNOW WHAT IS BEHIND A CERTIFICATION?

A PPE certificate includes a lot of information that maybe we don’t take care about because we do not know what it means. Sometimes we go directly to the important points, which are the protection standards we are looking for. However, a certificate includes a lot of important information who can help us to choose the PPEs we need:

1st: The laboratory who is releasing the certificate and the date that the certificate has been released.

Most of the laboratories who are legitimate are included in a list of accredited entities that we can look for depending on the country were the certificate is done. We must check the legitimacy of the laboratory to see if the certificate is real or fake. PD: we all know what companies are able to do in order to sell and save money.

In addition, the date of the certification has to be taken into account as commonly they should not accept a certificate more than five years validity

2nd: Description of the PPE.

We must check if the description and the reference of the certified garment corresponds to those from the PPE that we need.

3rd: Standards.

We must check the risks that are included in the certificates, including the data of the standards (checking that they are updated to the last version of those. In addition, we must check that the pictograms are correctly inlcuded and they are not outdated ones.

4th: Number of washes that the garment can be washed to still protecting against the risks mentioned. If not written, it means that it is only 5 washes.

5th: Any restriction that the garment may have.

I.e. it shall be weared along with another PPE to protect against the mentioned standards; if it has detachable sleeves we need to look the protection they are giving with or without sleeves… etc.

6th: The tests that has been performed shall not be outdated according to the standards and also shall refer to the reference/name of the garment or fabric tested by the same or different accredited laboratory.

As you may see, this does not end in here, and the importancy of protecting people shall make us revise all these steps everytime we need to buy a PPE. We can give you more information or training about this.

MY PERSONAL EXPERIENCE

When I started in an accredited laboratory, I did not know the importancy of all the information that it is written either in the certificate and in the test reports. The world that all of it covers it’s incredible! Even a small sentence in a test report or in a certificate can change the view of the PPE that we are buying incredibly.

For example, inside the tests reports you can found that the garment is compliant with all the tests that shall be done (FR, chemical, arc flash), but then, in the page where the design is mentioned, a small sentence that says;

`the metals and/or parts connected to the outside of the garment do not reach the innermost layer of the clothing` NON COMPLIANT

Then, you see that the garment you bought has a metal zipper/button in contact with the skin.

BOOOM! This garment is not protective at all! Yes, it can pass FR tests, it can pass Arc flash tests, but if a real arc reach to the garment, it will injure the user has the metal is in contact with the skin, and, at the end, it can be translated in 3rd degree burns or dead indeed!

Like this, I could say more and more… I even saw fake certificates copied and pasted by the accredited labs from some companies just to be able to sell!

So this is the importancy of certificate’s evaluation before start using a garment.

In wholesafety, we won’t compromise our garments like this, and our certificates will be always legitimate.