This International Standard contains principles and requirements for the competence, consistency and impartiality of the audit and certification of management systems of all types (e.g. quality management systems or environmental management systems) and for bodies providing these activities. Certification bodies operating to this International Standard need not offer all types of management system certification.

Certification of management systems (named in this International Standard "certification") is a third-party conformity assessment activity (see ISO/IEC 17000:2004, 5.5). Bodies performing this activity are therefore third-party conformity assessment bodies (named in this International Standard "certification body/bodies").

NOTE 1 Certification of a management system is sometimes also called "registration", and certification bodies are sometimes called "registrars".

NOTE 2 A certification body can be non-governmental or governmental (with or without regulatory authority).

NOTE 3 This International Standard can be used as a criteria document for accreditation or peer assessment or other audit processes.