Iso / ce / ccc

I'm seeking some advice.. other than the obvious "what the hell are you thinking"

Is anyone willing to share some sage wisdom on going through the process of becoming ISO / CE certified. with a goal of eventually going to the trouble of CCC for importing goods into China?

Cyclotronguy

Cyclotronguy said:

I'm seeking some advice.. other than the obvious "what the hell are you thinking"

Is anyone willing to share some sage wisdom on going through the process of becoming ISO / CE certified. with a goal of eventually going to the trouble of CCC for importing goods into China?

Cyclotronguy

Click to expand...

Not quite what you are asking but are you big enough to do it alone or do you have one or more Chinese importers ready to handle your products? If you do I'd ask them who to contact. If not then you'll probably have to go to China and learn Chinese.

Certification process

We have import agents around the Pacific and that's were the presure is coming from. The usual is to hire a North American firm, they come in and walk you though the process. Usually takes about 6 months. Longer if you've got glitches....... and everybody does. The goal is to have as few as possible at the start.

The North American firms that hand hold you through the process typically have a $50k opening salvo. Product testing runs $12k - $20K per product. The big hurdle isn't the build, it's documenting the build / rework / revisions and various protocols as well as the incoming material acceptance and internal tracking of material.

Once through the process you're open to ongoing inspection. How frequently and at what cost depends upon how good you are at jumping the hurldles

It's a dance for many markets it's openly acknowledged as a legal trade barrier that favors home grown.

Wife taught me to swear fluently in Mandarin!

Cyclotronguy

ISO is a certification that is about documenting your process. It isn't a requirement, except for maybe an individual company.

CE is a certification you have to meet to send products into many European countries (it's kinda like UL)

CCC is for import to China. The thing about importing into china is you'll only import one and they will reverse engineer and cut you out.

ISO-compliant manufacturing process is one thing, and a CE-compliant product is somewhat different, in my opinion. It seems that outside registrars are almost a requirement for most companies that want to achieve ISO compliance in a reasonable timeframe, but in my experience with CE testing and declaration, that is a much easier process to do for oneself. If you can figure out how to classify your product, you can easily arrange to get a 3rd-party test lab to do the required tests that would cover whatever CE standards you need to meet for the product. I definitely would not just "let them do it " for you, unless you have done the research to know the costs, so you can then know whether you're getting a good deal.

Send me a PM if you like and I can give you a little more detail on my (several) experiences with CE requirements testing.