When should you tell your certification body that you are leaving?

Tell the current certification body that you are transferring, and authorize the new body to ask for the audit file. Do that while your certificate stays in force. Ask for withdrawal only after the new certificate has been issued.

Why does the current body stay in the conversation?

The transfer review uses the certification record. You should supply your own copies of the reports, and you should keep them. The accepting body also asks the issuing body for the status of the certificate, the open findings, and the complaints it holds. That request needs your authorization. A slow reply from the old body is a reason to have your own copies ready. It is not a reason to skip the authorization.

You can apply elsewhere before any retention call. The facts of the certification still have to be available to the review. What those facts are is listed in documents for a transfer.

Which order avoids a gap?

1. Apply, and choose Transfer from another body.
2. Read the written offer: scope, expiry date, timing, and price.
3. Authorize the file request, and send the reports you hold.
4. Complete the review, including a visit if the offer includes one.
5. Receive the new certificate from SMG.
6. Then confirm withdrawal, or the end date, with the body you are leaving.

Cancellation comes last. The reason is in avoiding a gap. A surveillance visit that falls in the middle of this list should still happen if skipping it would leave the programme overdue. An overdue programme is one of the things that turns a transfer into a new-client audit.

What do you put in the note?

Say that you intend to transfer the named certificate, that it should remain valid until the transfer is complete, and that you authorize the exchange of the audit file. Fee arguments can sit in a different note. They should not be allowed to hold the reports back.

Start with the application so the written offer exists before that conversation gets complicated. IAF Consultancy prepares the offer quickly. SMG issues the certificate the review supports. The steps in plain order are also in how to change certification body.