One of the core responsibilities of the Accreditation Body of Montenegro (ATCG) is to establish clear and transparent accreditation criteria that must be met and continuously maintained by all accredited conformity assessment bodies. These criteria are based on the relevant harmonised accreditation standards.

ATCG shall grant accreditation to a conformity assessment body provided that all applicable accreditation requirements are fulfilled.

The essential accreditation requirements are defined in the relevant harmonised standards (Level 3 standards^*), such as MEST EN ISO/IEC 17025 for testing and calibration laboratories. However, additional requirements may also apply, arising, for example, from:

• legislation;
• the standard MEST EN ISO/IEC 17011;
• Level 4 documents^*, which prescribe additional requirements for conformity assessment bodies in relation to the harmonised Level 3 standards (e.g. MEST EN ISO/IEC 27006, which, in relation to EN ISO/IEC 17021-1, specifies additional requirements for certification bodies certifying information security management systems);
• Level 5 documents^*, which define requirements for the object of conformity assessment or for a specific conformity assessment activity;
• requirements of conformity assessment scheme owners; or
• ATCG rules and procedures, harmonised with the normative documents published by European and international accreditation organisations.

^* Classification according to Table 1 of document EA-1/06 issued by the European co-operation for Accreditation.

Document ZPR.01.27-1 – List of Documents Containing Requirements to Be Fulfilled by Applicants for Accreditation and Accredited CABs, which sets out the criteria for each individual accreditation scheme, is available in the section “Documents / Accreditation Criteria and Rules”.