The International Accreditation Service (IAS) has nearly single-handedly triggered the downward spiral of credibility of ISO certificates issued out of North America. Run by Indians but then claiming to be a “US” certification body, the IAS broke ANAB’s monopoly by offering low-cost, third-world accreditations by an AB with a California address. The overwhelming bulk of IAS-accredited bodies are in India and the Middle East, but the fact that their accreditation can cost less than half that of ANAB made them attractive. Now factor in that IAS assessors are dozey, ill-trained buggers who would accredit an ice cube if you told them to, and eventually, other larger CBs began to take notice and fled to IAS.
ANAB, meanwhile, couldn’t compete, so it began lowering its standards, too. They have since leaned into offering training over accreditation, no longer able to compete with IAS’s low rates and easy-peasy accreditations.
IAS could have stepped up and tried to become a credible player, but scammers gotta eat. It took me all of five minutes to find one of their CBs offering open consulting in violation of ISO 17021-1.
Meet BCI Cert, a CB located in Canada, but whose actual employees appear to be Iranian. IAS’s accreditation scope for BCI Cert lists the point of contact as one “Abbas Y. Shiviari,” A Canadian Chamber of Commerce listing also shows “AY Shiviari” as operating BCI Cert, but under the name “BCI Global.”
One of BCI’s employees is Mahsa Tagavi, an Iranian transplant living in Canada. Some posts by her on LinkedIn were then “liked” by one Behzad Shiviari, another Iranian in Canada, whom I presume is actually “Abbas” or related to him. Next, multiple posts started popping up on LinkedIn promoting BCI Cert under the profile of one “Allen C” who uses a 2D cartoon as his avatar and hides his real name.
All the usual warming signs are there: obfuscated names, hidden international ties, no direct employee list, no single point of contact on the website, dubious claims of North American heritage, and … well, IAS accreditation.
Scammers Gonna Scam
But, yeah, it took me five minutes to find a violation, something IAS can’t be bothered to do.
By doing a reverse search of the BCI Cert phone number appearing on the IAS accreditation certificate, I found it was shared by BCI Academy, a training and consulting body. Likewise, both BCI Cert and BCI Academy have the same street address in Ontario. Well, that’s a lie, since it’s actually a virtual office, so they don’t have any physical office at all.
But are they violating ISO 17021-1?
Of course they are! BCI Academy’s website says, “our courses are delivered inhouse/onsite, providing handson training with customized workshops targeting your own specific business operations and processes.”
Want more? Here:
We offer a comprehensive range of learning services that cover management system standards such as ISO 9001; ISO 14001, and IATF 16949. Our training services are offered onsite (in-house) as coaching of small groups or one-on-one as needed during the development and implementation Our courses can be tailored to your company spending time focused on your business goals and objectives.
Our instructors are skilled and experienced will customize the course in such a way that your company’s unique needs and situations are considered and addressed. All our training courses can be customized further to meet your specific needs.
Meanwhile, some Canadian business records indicate the owner of BCI Academy is … you guessed it .. “AY Shiviari.”
What does ISO 17021-1 say?
Arranging training and participating as a trainer is not considered consultancy, provided that, where the course relates to management systems or auditing, it is confined to the provision of generic information; i.e. the trainer should not provide client-specific solutions.
Now, in any other year, I would file a formal complaint. But with the IAF and various CBs and ABs now permitted to ban complaints outright, and allowing CBs to full-on buy consulting companies, despite both of those things being violations of ISO 17021-1, too, there’s no point. But I will continue to report on them, name-and-shame them, and add them to the list of certificate mills.
Christopher Paris is the founder and VP Operations of Oxebridge. He has over 35 years’ experience implementing ISO 9001 and AS9100 systems, and helps establish certification and accreditation bodies with the ISO 17000 series. He is a vocal advocate for the development and use of standards from the point of view of actual users. He is the writer and artist of THE AUDITOR comic strip, and is currently writing the DR. CUBA pulp novel series. Visit www.drcuba.world
