We always look at product safety during inspections. For example, we know the difference between Class I vs. Class II for the hi-pot test and their parameters, conduct incline tests for furniture regularly, and know that drawstrings on children garments are dangerous. We perform these kinds of tests every day in our organization.
And of course, we do look at certificates. In particular, for electrical products, sometimes the client sends us a certificate or requests that we check the certificate provided by the factory, and we use it. For example, we look at the CDF (Constructional Data Form) and we compare it with what we see on the critical components (same appearance, same marking, etc.), and that’s quite typical.
However, our inspectors are not compliance consultants. They won’t call the issuer of a certificate or report in order to confirm authenticity or ask for missing results on key standards. That has to be documented in advance by the compliance/quality manager of the importing company. The compliance/quality manager has to know what is required and has to archive all that information in a technical file for years to come.
Importers need to know what the safety requirements of their products are. We do not pretend we can replace your compliance manager.