The participating companies specify a central office that has overall responsibility for defining and monitoring the management system. All companies operate with an identical management system, in other words with a shared quality policy, shared quality goals and shared quality management documentation.

The advantage of such a matrix certification is that not every company is audited every year by the certification agency. Spot check audits at selected sites are sufficient to obtain or maintain the certificate for all companies. This offers more than just financial advantages since such audits also impose an internal workload as well. Naturally, it is preferable to incur this workload only every five years rather than every year. As a rough estimate, about 30% of the matrix participants and the central office are audited every year – with every participant audited once during the certification cycle.

For a detailed description and particulars, please consult the downloadable document on matrix auditing.

ECM audits and technical assessments can be combined to reduce the workload for ECMs and workshops.

VERS has concluded relevant framework agreements with authorised certification companies and offers combined audits (ECM+technical assessment).

This variant saves the workshop time and money since with a combined audit only two auditors (technical assessment and ECM) visit the workshop at the same time to perform the audit. The request for a combined audit can be directed to VERS or to the ECM provider.

After passing the combined audit, the workshop receives a legally valid ECM certificate from the ECM certifier and a technical approval from VERS.