Certification of electrical products for North American market

Apave Certification supports you in bringing your products to market for export to the North American market (United States and Canada) thanks to our certification solutions and services:
- Mandatory product certification via a Nationally Recognized Testing Laboratory (NRTL)
 - Support for the FCC SDoC declaration procedure

The 5-step certification process:

1. Construction Review
 - The laboratory engineer (the NRTL) examines your product's technical documentation.
 - Component review: the lab verifies whether critical components (fuses, transformers, cables) are already certified themselves.
Theoretical compliance: Verification of clearance distances, electrical diagrams, and materials used for the enclosure (flame-retardant plastics, etc.).

2. Product Testing
The physical stage. Prototypes are sent to the laboratory where they undergo extreme testing according to applicable standards (often UL standards):
 - Electric shock:dielectric strength test.
 - Temperature rise: measurement of temperatures during normal operation and in the event of a failure.
 - Mechanical tests: impact resistance, stability, flammability.
 - Abnormal conditions: short-circuit simulation to see if the device catches fire.

3. Initial Factory Inspection
Unlike CE marking (which is often self-declaratory), the NRTL must verify where and how the product is manufactured before giving its approval.
 - An Apave Certification inspector visits the production site.
 - They verify that you have the means to test each unit at the end of the line (usually grounding and dielectric strength tests).
 - They audit your quality management system to ensure that no unauthorized modifications will be made to the certified product.

4. Certification and marking
If the tests and factory audit are successful:
 - The NRTL issues a Certificate of Conformity.
 - The product is listed in the laboratory's public directory.
 - Authorization to apply the NRTL mark to the product label.

5. Continuous product surveillance
Continuous surveillance (often called Follow-up Service or FUS) ensures that the product remains compliant throughout production: every product coming off the production line must be strictly identical to the prototype that was initially tested in the laboratory.
The inspector verifies that the manufactured product is identical to the model initially tested. Any major modification to the product requires an update to the certification file.