Oxebridge has filed a complaint against the accreditation body United Accreditation Forum (UAF) alleging improper accredited testing by one of its laboratory clients.
The case arose when whistleblowers reported irregularities in tests performed by Eurolab, a division of Turkish certification body TurCert. A test report for chemotherapy gloves appears to have been conducted outside the scope of TurCert’s accreditation, yet bears the UAF logo regardless.
Specifically, the test report certified PPE exam gloves under ASTM D6978 for “assessment of resistance of medical gloves to permeation by chemotherapy gloves.” A review of the scope of accreditation issued by UAF for TurCert, however, does not list ASTM D6978, nor any test scopes related to gloves. TurCert holds some limited related accreditation for PPE products, including masks and gowns, but none for gloves. The accredited scope also only includes visual inspection, not product testing for those PPE products.
Oxebridge founder Christopher Paris requested an informal clarification from UAF, asking if any of the listed activities in the UAF scope of accreditation somehow included chemotherapy glove inspections, even if ASTM D6978 was not listed specifically. UAF representative Yuliya Lalova upheld the certification, but only by claiming “The mentioned test report was within the scope of accreditation.” Lalova did not specify which listed accreditation activity included the glove inspection, and then ignored a follow-up email requesting clarification.
Now a formal complaint has been filed, alleging UAF improperly reviewed the issue, and that it is knowingly allowing TurCert to issue certificates outside of its approved scope.
The test certificate was issued to Golden Global Trading and Healthcare SDN BHD of Malaysia, prompting Oxebridge to add a second allegation based on the fact that the UAF scope of accreditation does not allow TurCert to issue certificates in that country at all.
Paris acknowledges that “UAF may have a reasonable explanation for all of this,” but noted that “their near-complete inability to communicate raises suspicions of their culpability. UAF just needs to come clean and explain themselves.”
A prior complaint was filed with UAF in 2020 against TurCert for questionable PPE test certificates. TurCert’s CEO Hasan Katlu responded by attacking Oxebridge, prompting the matter to be escalated to UAF in December of 2020. In January of 2021, Lalova claimed TurCert was still investigating the matter and that it would reply soon, but UAF then dropped the matter entirely without explanation. It has not provided Oxebridge any updates for eight months.
A similar complaint filed in 2019 against TNV Certification was then escalated to UAF, who ignored it for over ten months. UAF claimed at the time this was due to staffing changes. Yuliya Lalova was alleged to have been brought on staff to solve that problem. To date, Oxebridge has been unable to confirm if Lalova is a real person.
UAF had shown a prior tendency to obfuscate the names of its staff, making it difficult to know who is managing the company.
UAF is owned by Dr. Tejwant Chandi of Albemarle Medical Associates in North Carolina. Oxebridge has warned UAF that if any defective products were authorized by TurCert under the UAF accreditation, and if UAF failed to take action to protect the health of users of those products, Dr. Chandi may face formal complaints with his relevant medical licensing boards.
IAF regional bodies including APAC (Asian Pacific Accreditation Cooperation) and EA (European Cooperation for Accreditation) have routinely worked to defend and cover up actions by accredited bodies, even when risks to public safety and health are identified. Oxebridge argues such organizations are “supralegal” and not answerable to any international laws, allowing them to endanger the public with impunity.
