Soil Association Certification (SA Cert) Certificate of Inspection Terms and conditions

1.0 Service

1.1 COI service

Soil Association Certification (SA Cert) can endorse the Certificates of Inspection (CoI) product for its contracted organic clients as part of the requirement of the EU organic regulations (EC) 834/2007 and 889/2008, specifically EC/1235/2008 allowing SA Cert’s clients to submit the CoI request via the EU TRACES NT portal.

1.2 NOP service

SA Cert can endorse the NOP Import Certificate (NOPIC) product for its contracted organic clients as part of the requirement of the US Organic Regulations § 205.273. These will be submitted to SA Cert via the excel sheet provide and published via the Organic Integrity Platform (OID).

2.0 Eligibility

In order to be eligible to apply for an endorsed certificate for export to the EU or US you must::

• hold a valid SA Cert Certificate for the requested organic products
• and have purchased the sufficient amount of credits for this process with SA Cert.

Failure to meet the eligibility criteria will mean the certificate cannot be endorsed.

3.0 Cost, refund and replacement

3.1 Cost

The cost of endorsing the certificate, as outlined in 1.0, is charged per certificate for COIs and per consignment for NOPICs, and listed on our website.

3.2 Refunds

If a certificate is purchased without meeting the eligibility criteria, as detailed in 2.0, a refund will not apply.

If after purchasing a credit, and the certificate being endorsed by SA Cert staff,  the certificate is then no longer required by the Client, a refund will not apply.

If a SA Cert client purchases an incorrect amount of credits, or, the service is no longer required a refund may apply, please contact us within 28 days of purchase to discuss. If you are eligible for a refund, this will be made within 28 working days from the date of the request.

3.3 Replacements or changes

Should a certificate require amending or replacing, no additional cost will apply unless the change exceeds three separate requests. Thereafter, this will be considered as a new certificate and a charge will apply.  Our standard delivery timescales, outlined in clause 4.1, apply after receipt of each amended submission.

4.0 Delivery

4.1 Standard Delivery

Providing the eligibility criteria outlined in section 2.0 has been met; all supporting documents and the correct certificate information has been uploaded or submitted, and the certificate request has been received by SA Cert, standard electronic delivery of a certificate will take up to 3 working days from the date of purchase.

Please be advised that additional checks may be required if your consignment has a high-risk product or high-risk country identified in line with (EC) 1235/2008 which will increase turnaround time. The Import/Export team will inform you via email if any additional documentation or photos of the consignment is required.

4.2 Working days and hours 

Our working hours are 8:30am to 6pm Monday to Friday, excluding public holidays. We have a limited service of 12pm to 4pm on Saturdays reserved for pre-booked COIs and emergency amendments.

Please send your CoI requests to SA Cert via the TRACES NT portal at least 1 working day before the consignment leaves Great Britain. If this process is not respected, you expose yourself to the risk that your CoI cannot be verified and issued in time, and that either SA Cert. or the European authorities refuse to validate the CoI in TRACESNT for clearance of the batch as organic on the European market. 

Please send your NOP requests to SA Cert, using the form provided on the Exporting Page, to coi@soilassociation.org. Please ensure this is sent with ample time prior to the goods leaving GB as we work to a 48 hour turn-around time for these requests. If any changes are required, you run the risk of your goods not being able to clear into the US.

For all other terms and conditions refer to client contract.

5.0 Currency

All fees and charges will be processed in UK pounds sterling, with VAT applied at the applicable rate.