Egyptian AB Responds to Complaints with Unhinged, Arrogant Attacks

The Egyptian accreditation body EGAC wants you to know a few things. First, that it doesn’t give a shit about formal complaints or its obligations under the AB standard ISO 17011, nor any of the requirements of membership in the IAF. And, second, that it dares you to send complaints its way if only to prove that it can ignore those, too. (So I want you to do just that, and will give you the email addresses below.)

Allegations of Fraud by Four Separate CBs

In a series of emails submitted by an industry whistleblower named “Manav” — who, for the record, has nothing to do with Oxebridge — a dramatic and compelling pattern of corruption and incompetence on the part of EGAC was laid bare. In roughly five separate emails, Manav pummelled EGAC with evidence seeming to show that four separate certification bodies had issued 17 certificates that did not match their scope of accreditation issued by EGAC:

• QRO (6 out-of-scope certificates alleged)
• Royal Assessment (5 out-of-scope certificates alleged)
• ICV (5 out-of-scope certificates alleged)
• Hawkeye Certification (1 out-of-scope certificate alleged)

Under ISO 17011, EGAC is not only supposed to prohibit such corruption, but is most certainly supposed to take action when such things are reported. They are required to process complaints fairly, with objectivity and impartiality. There’s also a pesky clause in ISO 17011 that says “investigation and decision on complaints shall not result in any discriminatory actions against the complainant.”

But EGAC isn’t having any of that.

Disproving Corruption by Doing Corruption

So, instead, EGAC responded back with two formal, written emails that represent some of the most unhinged, arrogant, and wholly preposterous responses I have ever seen in my 35+ years of experience in the ISO scheme. Strap in for this one, it’s a wild ride.

They first insulted Manav, suggesting he has conflicts of interest to discredit the complaints outright, and demanded he give information about himself, presumably so they can have him arrested. (ISO 17011 violation # 1.)

Then, they demanded that he provide some evidence that he was harmed by the CBs subject to the complaint when no such requirement exists. People can complain about CBs for any reason they want, and the AB is responsible — per ISO 17011 — to investigate. (ISO 17011 violation # 2.)

Next, EGAC jumped to the defense of the CBs before investigating anything. Instead, they insisted the complaints were invalid on their face and declared the out-of-scope certificates are “not a deliberate malpractice or fraudulent behavior.” Since they never performed an investigation, EGAC would have no way of knowing that. (ISO 17011 violation # 3.)

Next, EGAC just waved away wholesale violations by CBs, handing them a get-out-of-jail-free card, by saying it’s all moot, since “it can happen that they have one or two misinterpretations” on certification scopes. In short, EGAC doesn’t have to do its job and CBs can violate the rules at will. In reality, EGAC isn’t supposed to allow a single error, since it’s literally their job to prevent that. (ISO 17011 violation # 4.)

Next, EGAC full-on harassed and defamed Manav, calling his claims “delusive” and saying, “it seems like you want to complain first and then determine what you want to complain about.” In reality, it was patently clear what Manav was complaining about, since EGAC repeated the theme of the complaints (out-0f-scope certifications bearing the EGAC logo) proving it fully understood the complaints. (ISO 17011 violation # 5.)

Finally, after violating its obligations under 17011 at least five times, EGAC shifted its mood entirely, as if the cocaine they were smoking suddenly kicked in and they were hit by an adrenaline rush. Now, EGAC thanked Manav for the complaints, and then challenged the entire planet to send them more complaints, so they could ignore those too:

Therefore, EGAC thanks your group for the big effort you spent for collecting the information. We encourage your group to keep searching and provide us with the information that you collect. This will be a big help for our assessments.

What a bunch of absolute dicks.

The IAF Does Nothing, Of Course

As you likely know, EGAC is a signatory of the Arabian IAF regional body ARAC, which does absolutely zero proper assessments of its AB members and allows them to violate ISO 17011 and the IAF mandatory documents however they like. EGAC is also a member of the equally-corrupt IAF regional bodies AFRAC (Africa) and EA (Europe.)

Not a single one of those bodies, nor the IAF itself, is doing anything about EGAC’s decades-long pattern of rubber-stamping accreditations for whatever shady organization sets up shop and wants to start printing ISO certificates.

Worse, however, is the fact that EGAC is an actual government-approved body, operating under the Egyptian Ministry of Trade and Industry. So if you needed any reminders of how corrupt the Egyptian government is, look no further.

Needless to say, the official EGAC response was unsigned, because the official sending it was smart enough not to put their name on it. I think we can blame EGAC director Hany el Desouki for not having proper control of his staff, assuming he didn’t send the letters himself.

I do think we should honor their request, though, and send them more complaints about their fraudulent stable of CBs. So feel free to do that! If you notice fraud by any EGAC-accredited body, be sure to send it to certification@egac.gov.eg and include copies to the IAF at secretary@IAF.nu and Hany el Desouki at hanyeldesouki@gmail.com and hanyeldesouki@egac.gov.eg.

Read the Original Letters

You can read the entire EGAC letters here; emphasis and spelling errors are from the original documents:

LETTER # 1

Dear Unknown complainant,

EGAC appreciates your complaint as well as anyone else’s.

For a start QRO CB is accredited by EGAC and has regular surveillances every year with thorough head office assessment and a lot of witnessing. So, your complaint can be one of the subjects of the next QRO assessment, so thank you for that.

EGAC never got any complaints from you or any other competitive CB about QRO. EGAC cannot depend on any subjective claims. So, we should ask you to kindly support your claims with some evidences, especially about the everyday complaints about QRO.

But we have to stop you and ask you to provide evidence about EGAC’s promotion of anyone’s malpractice. Actually, these False claims from you is malpractice and need to be investigated, as you do not provide any evidence or information about your identity and the actual source and reason for your complaint.

Please let us know about yourself. Are you representing some group or you are just investigating the QRO CB, out of the goodness of your heart, which is one of the thousands of CBs in India. What is your relation with this CB? Please be informed that we will investigate your email and your identity from the links. We cannot promise you confidentiality if this investigation proves bad competitive behavior.

Actually, the example you sent us about the certificate issued to “Bavarian Machining Works Private Limited”, is perfectly within the scope of QRO QMS codes 17 & 18. This company’s main scope is producing “Precision Machined Components”. If you do not know this is covered by the QMS codes 17 & 18. Also, there is no evidence that this was not as per standard guidelines.

So, whatever evidence you sent are evidence of good performance not malpractice. However, this will not detain EGAC from investigating this particular company files during the next visit as part of this complaint investigation. But we are not going to send you any feedback as long as you do not reveal your identity and relation to this CB.

Also, EGAC still encourages you to send whatever evidence you have along with your actual reason and identity. But please do not send False or delusive claims.

Regards,​

MS CBs Accreditation Department
Egyptian Accreditation Council, EGAC.
Tel.: 202 – 25275224/5/7

Email: certification@egac.gov.eg

LETTER # 2

 Dear complainant group,

(who call themselves Manav, and define themselves as ISO consultant)

As you addressed your last message by (WE).

If you are really (ISO consultant) as you define yourselves, what is the real reason for your complaint? When you say complaint, you need to explain the harm done to you? Do you mean that these CBs are not permitting you to give consultation to their certified clients? What is the real objective of your group? Why are you sending the information as complaints, not as helping information, and not sending it to the CBs themselves? Why are you trying to make a scandal for the CBs or for EGAC? Are you trying to force EGAC to take action against these CBs, without investigation?

This is not working; as all information can be about some misinterpretation in the codes or the categories. The codes you suggested are not half correct also. This is not a deliberate malpractice or fraudulent behavior. Codes and Categories are not the same for all products as they depend on the use of the product and are usually confirmed during the audit, e.g., it can be used as food additive (code 3) or as medicine (code 13). Also, most mentioned CBs have big scopes including many codes and categories, and they have many clients, and what you mentioned is just a few of their clients, so it can happen that they have one or two misinterpretations.

We need to remind you that you started your series of complaints by saying that the EGAC accredited CBs does not perform complete audits and are issuing the certificate without due compliances. You claimed that EGAC is promoting their malpractice, and we told you that you do not give evidence which make it delusive. Then you focused your claims to issuing certificates outside their accredited scope which was found to be about different interpretation of scopes with some mistakes that is to be investigated. Now you are threating to complain about open scope. It seems like you want to complain first and then determine what you want to complain about.

Also, it seems like you are targeting only CBs accredited by EGAC, and only their clients that you have different interpretation of their codes. However, EGAC has explained before; in its answers, that it will investigate the information sent in all your messages and take the necessary actions. EGAC’s common measure will be to investigate these mistakes, and if they are consistent, after filtering them.

Therefore, EGAC thanks your group for the big effort you spent for collecting the information. We encourage your group to keep searching and provide us with the information that you collect. This will be a big help for our assessments.

Regards,

MS CBs Accreditation Department
Egyptian Accreditation Council, EGAC.
Tel.: 202 – 25275224/5/7

Email: certification@egac.gov.eg

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UPDATE 11 February 2024: EGAC continues to pile on the self-inflicted wounds, and has since sent a third letter. In this one, they admit they were wrong about false and defamatory claims they made against Manav, but don’t actually apologize — which is a problem, because in Egypt defamation is a criminal offense, not a civil one.

Notice that they continue to send their emails unsigned, even as they threaten to doxx Manav.

Dear complainant group,

You mentioned that you are concerned with the certification performance in India. You also mentioned that you are not targeting some group or some AB, as you already did that with IAS and JAS_ANZ. You also, mentioned that you are not looking to force action from EGAC without investigation.

So, we consider this as good conduct and we accept your notification for what you see as bad behavior from some CBs. We mentioned before that we are going to investigate what you introduced to us during our following visits.

You should be waiting and monitoring as you did before and results of the investigation will show on our website. Incase that any of your allegations proved to be legitimate, then actions will appear on the website.

So, please calm down let us work on this.
Again, we thank you,

Regards,
EGAC Certification Manager