Calibration FAQ's

How long does calibration of equipment take?

New instruments purchased from RS Components can be calibrated and dispatched within two days of your order being placed.
RS Calibration can collect your existing equipment, calibrate and return it within four working days. This saves you time and ensures that your instrument is back with you quickly and securely.

What is UKAS?

The United Kingdom Accreditation Service (UKAS) is the sole national accreditation body recognised by government to assess, against internationally agreed standards, organisations that provide certification, testing, inspection and calibration service.
An organisation gaining UKAS accreditation has demonstrated its competence, impartiality and performance capability.
RS Calibration achieved UKAS accreditation in 1990. As a UKAS accredited laboratory the RS Calibration service is very closely monitored by UKAS to ensure that it is end-to-end compliant.

What is UKAS calibration?

When you request the UKAS level of service you will receive a certificate carrying the UKAS logo, recognised as the industry mark of quality.

This gives you confidence that the calibration has been carried out to the high standards required by UKAS and that all measurements can be traced back to UK national standards.

What is RS standard calibration?

When you request RS standard calibration, the measurements reported on the certificate are also carried out using equipment with values traceable to national standards. All procedures employed and results reported are in compliance with the requirements of the International Standard ISO/IEC 17025:2005.

Equipment calibrated to RS standard will gain an RS approved certificate.

What's the difference between UKAS and RS standard calibration?

From a technical perspective, there is no difference between UKAS and RS service levels. All calibration is carried out in the same laboratory by the same personnel using the same calibration procedures and equipment.

From an accountability perspective, many businesses require the UKAS endorsement in order to maintain compliance.

RS

UKAS

Traceable to national standards

Yes

Yes

UKAS approved laboratory 

No 

Yes

ISO9001:2008 

Yes 

No

UKAS approved certificate 

No 

Yes

What is SYSCAL?

A 'SYSCAL'is a SYStem CALibration, essentially it is a calibration which includes more than one item i.e. creates a system.
As an example a temperature indicator and probe that are used together to measure temperature form a system. We can calibrate these items together, assuring the accuracy of the whole system.

What is ILAC?

Since February 2013 our UKAS calibration service have had a symbol alongside to demonstrate an international agreement for the acceptance of the quality of calibration performed. The laboratory is able to use this mark, as it is an approved ILAC signatory, approved by our national accredited signatory body, UKAS.

The International Laboratory Accreditation Co-operation (ILAC) was established with the aim of developing international co-operation for facilitating trade by promoting the acceptance of accredited test & calibration results around the world. The ILAC arrangement has developed a global network of accredited testing & calibration laboratories, which can be relied upon to provide accurate results.

The arrangement provides significant technical underpinning to international trade. Prior to the ILAC there had been no international mutual recognition agreement between accredited laboratories. As the accreditation of laboratories have to be assessed and recognised as competent by an ILAC signatory accreditation bodies, which in the United Kingdom is UKAS, a level of quality and proficiency has to be attained by all laboratories. All ILAC signatory bodies are in turn peer reviewed to show that they in turn meet ILAC's criteria for competence. This ensures that all accredited laboratories that meet their national accreditation bodies standards (which are signed up to the agreement) are all equivalent to each other. This enables global acceptance of test & calibration results worldwide, i.e. the calibration results performed in the UK are done to the same standards required by any other accreditation body within the ILAC agreement, making the results transferable to any of these markets, where previously they would have required re-testing.

Who is signed up to ILAC?

To date the list of accreditation bodies counties signed up to ILAC Mutual Recognition Arrangement (MRA) are: Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, People's Republic of China, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cuba, Czech Republic, Denmark, Egypt, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Guatemala, Hungary, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, Republic of Korea, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Mexico, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russian Federation, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Switzerland, Chinese Taipei, Thailand, Tunisia, Turkey, United Kingdom, United States of America, Uruguay and Vietnam. Therefore a calibration performed to a UKAS standard in the UK is transferable worldwide to the countries listed as equivalent to the calibration standards within that country, making them trusted and usable, without the need for re-testing.

This service will aid our customers by calibrating their equipment to the required standards and clearly stating on the calibration certificates that the results are accepted within a global network.

Want to know more? Visit https://www.ilac.org/

Can I get an electronic version of my calibration certificate?

Yes, RS Calibration can supply certificates electronically. Just request this when you order.