EAC certificate for the Eurasian Economic Union

An EAC certificate issued under a technical regulation of the Customs Union is valid in all five member states, Russia, Kazakhstan, Belarus, Armenia and Kyrgyzstan, without repeating the procedure in each. Which regulation applies is decided by the product, and a product commonly falls under two or three at once. Each regulation says whether the product takes a certificate from an accredited body or a declaration you register yourself, under the standard schemes of EEC Council Decision No. 44 of 18 April 2018. A legal entity registered inside the Union must be the applicant; a foreign manufacturer cannot apply alone.

Certificate or declaration: which one does your product take?

Each technical regulation specifies, per product category, whether conformity is proven by a certificate or by a declaration, and which schemes are open. The schemes themselves are standardised by EEC Council Decision No. 44 of 18 April 2018. Scheme 1с is serial production: an accredited laboratory tests the samples, the certification body inspects the factory, and an inspection follows every year. Scheme 3с covers a single batch on laboratory tests alone. On the declaration side, 1д is serial production on your own evidence, 3д is serial production on accredited-laboratory tests, and 2д and 4д are the batch equivalents. The scheme number is printed on the document, so customs sees it.

A certificate is issued by a certification body accredited by Rosakkreditatsiya (the FSA) and carries the body's name next to yours. An EAC declaration of conformity is signed by the applicant and registered in the FSA unified register under the procedure of EEC Council Decision No. 41 of 20 March 2018, which also fixes what the applicant must hold before signing. Where a product falls under two regulations it is often possible to satisfy one by certificate and the other by declaration. That split can remove a whole round of sample testing, so analyse it before anything ships to a laboratory.

Which regulation applies?

Product scope is defined per regulation and the overlaps are the difficult part. A mains-powered tool with a motor can sit under TR CU 010/2011 on machinery and TR CU 020/2011 on electromagnetic compatibility at the same time; a rated voltage inside the 50 to 1000 V AC or 75 to 1500 V DC band of TR CU 004/2011 adds a third. Most of that electrical equipment also needs a declaration under TR EAEU 037/2016 on the restriction of hazardous substances.

Getting this wrong costs in a specific way: the testing is valid, the report is genuine, and the document cannot be issued because it names the wrong regulation. The analysis has to come before the laboratory booking.

The applicant has to be inside the Union

A certificate names an applicant, and that applicant must be a legal entity or individual entrepreneur registered in a member state: the importer, or an authorised representative appointed by the manufacturer under contract. Decision No. 41 repeats the same rule for declarations. This is not a mailing address. The entity carries the obligations for the product on the market and answers to the surveillance authority if a batch fails.

For manufacturers without a local subsidiary this is the item that most often delays issuance, because it surfaces when the certificate is ready to sign instead of at the start.

Validity and what it costs later

Serial-production certificates run for up to five years. Where validity exceeds one year, inspection control, annual under scheme 1с, is a condition of the certificate staying valid, and that recurring inspection is routinely left out of first estimates of EAC certificate cost. Miss the inspection and the body can suspend the certificate.

A certificate for a single batch under scheme 3с avoids the inspection entirely but covers only that consignment. For a product shipping repeatedly the serial certificate wins, because each batch certificate repeats the laboratory tests.

The document is the same in every member state; the applicant, the accreditation register and the layers on top are national. Those are on the country pages for Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus.

The regulations most products meet

A product under two regulations needs its conformity proven under both. The documents can differ in type; a certificate under one and a declaration under another is a normal outcome and often saves a round of testing.