Zero non-conformities, three standards, and what they mean when we are in your building

24 Aug 2026

Inteb has maintained certification to ISO 9001, ISO 14001 and ISO 45001, with no non-conformities raised at audit. Here is what each standard commits us to, and what it means for the clients whose buildings we work in.

Inteb has maintained certification against all three of the management standards we work to: ISO 9001 for quality, ISO 14001 for environmental management, and ISO 45001 for occupational health and safety. This year’s audit closed with zero non-conformities across all three.

We are proud of that, and the second half of the sentence is the part that matters. A non-conformity is what an auditor raises when the way a business actually operates falls short of the standard it claims to work to. Coming through with none raised is not a formality. It means somebody independent went looking and found nothing that needed correcting.

Inteb has held all three continuously since June 2019, audited every year throughout, by The British Assessment Bureau, who are UKAS accredited. That last detail is worth knowing, because accreditation is what separates a certificate a buyer can rely on from one they cannot.

What follows is what each of the three standards actually commits us to, because that is the part a client experiences.

What the audit involves

ISO certification is not awarded once and left alone. It runs on a three year cycle, and in each of the intervening years an auditor carries out a surveillance visit that samples the system in depth. At the end of the cycle the whole thing is audited again from the beginning.

So certification is only ever as current as the last visit. Ours took place on 9th June 2026 and the certificates run to June 2028.

An audit of this kind is not a document review. Auditors talk to people who were not expecting to be talked to, follow a job from instruction through to invoice, and look for the gap between the written procedure and what somebody actually did on a Tuesday afternoon. That is the point of them, and it is why a nil return is worth reporting.

For a business that has grown as much as ours has over the past few years, being asked each year whether the system still reflects how we genuinely work is a fair question, and a useful one.

ISO 45001, the one that matters most on site

Of the three, health and safety is the standard that shows up most directly in client work, because a great deal of what we do happens inside somebody else’s building.

Metering validation means engineers in plant rooms and risers. Some of it happens overnight, to avoid disrupting tenants. It involves live electrical systems, confined spaces, work at height, and buildings that are unfamiliar until the moment we walk into them.

ISO 45001 is the framework that governs how that is planned. It is why a method statement and risk assessment arrives before anyone does, why the person turning up holds the competencies the job requires, and why an incident, however minor, gets recorded and fed back rather than mentioned in passing and forgotten.

For a managing agent, that is not an abstraction. Letting a contractor into an occupied building carries real responsibility, and the paperwork exists because somebody has to be able to demonstrate the decision was a reasonable one.

Section: ISO 9001, consistency rather than quality

Quality is a slippery word. In practice ISO 9001 is about consistency, which is a more useful thing to promise.

It means a survey follows the same method whoever carries it out. It means findings are recorded the same way, so a report produced this year can be compared against one produced two years ago. It means when something goes wrong, and occasionally it does, there is a route for the client to raise it and a requirement on us to establish why rather than simply apologise.

For a client with a portfolio rather than a single building, that consistency is the whole point. Twenty buildings surveyed twenty slightly different ways produces data that cannot be compared, which quietly wastes most of the value of having commissioned the work.

ISO 14001, and practising what we advise

There is an obvious point to make here and it is worth making plainly. A consultancy that advises other organisations on managing their environmental impact ought to be able to demonstrate it manages its own.

ISO 14001 is what makes that demonstrable rather than assertable. It requires the impacts of our own operations to be identified, measured and improved against objectives, and it requires an auditor to come and check.

It also keeps us honest about the difficulty of the advice we give. Measuring your own footprint properly, finding the data is patchy, and working out what to do about it is a familiar experience in this office, which makes for better conversations with clients going through the same thing.

What this means at procurement stage

There is a practical benefit that has nothing to do with the standards themselves.

When somebody wants to bring us into a building, they usually have to get us through their own procurement or supplier onboarding process first. That means a prequalification questionnaire, insurance certificates, method statements, competency records, and evidence of certification. Assembling it is dull, and it is often the slowest part of getting useful work started.

Holding all three standards means that pack already exists and can be sent in one go. The person putting us forward internally is not chasing us for documents, and the compliance question is closed before it is asked.

There is a further point worth knowing. Our ISO 45001 certification is registered under SSIP, the umbrella body for health and safety prequalification schemes, with Inteb assessed as a Contractor. Member schemes recognise each other’s assessments, so if your own supplier onboarding runs through a different SSIP scheme, ours should be accepted without putting us through a separate health and safety assessment first.

That removes a step rather than simply evidencing one, which on a portfolio with several buildings and several managing agents adds up to a meaningful amount of time nobody has to spend.

“Zero non-conformities is the part we are most pleased about. The audit is thorough and it should be, and if the system on paper does not match what people actually do on site, it gets found. Coming through with nothing raised across all three standards says our processes stand up to that kind of examination, which is exactly what we want it to say to a client.”

Natasha, Operations Director

Certification is not a finish line. The next audit is already in the diary, and the standards themselves keep moving as expectations of suppliers rise.

That suits us. Holding all three means the way we plan site work, look after people in unfamiliar buildings, record what we find and account for our own impact is examined regularly by somebody with no reason to be generous about it. It is the most reliable way we know of making sure the service a client receives in year three is at least as good as the one they received in year one.

That is the commitment behind the certificates, and it is one we intend to keep raising rather than simply maintain.

Certificates and scopes are available on request, and we are happy to complete whatever prequalification paperwork your process requires.

ISO 9001:2015 Quality management. Certificate number 223456.

ISO 14001:2015 Environmental management. Certificate number 223454.

ISO 45001:2018 SSIP Occupational health and safety management. Certificate number 223455. Inteb is assessed as a Contractor for SSIP purposes.

Certification body: The British Assessment Bureau, UKAS accredited.

Initial certification: 5th June 2019. Latest issue: 9th June 2026. Expiry: 5th June 2028.

Certified scope: sustainability consultancy services, energy procurement and management, energy compliance, data analysis, site survey and audits, management of utility meter installations, solar PV installations, infrastructure and electrical investigation work within the UK.#

FAQs

Which standards does Inteb ISO certification cover?
Inteb ISO certification covers three management standards: ISO 9001:2015 for quality, ISO 14001:2015 for environmental management, and ISO 45001:2018 for occupational health and safety. All three have been held continuously since 5th June 2019 and are certified by The British Assessment Bureau, who are UKAS accredited.

What does zero non-conformities mean?
A non-conformity is what an auditor raises when the way a business operates falls short of the standard it claims to work to. Zero non-conformities means an independent auditor examined the system across all three standards and found nothing requiring correction.

Does Inteb ISO certification include SSIP registration?
Yes. The ISO 45001 certification is registered under SSIP, with Inteb assessed as a Contractor. SSIP member schemes recognise each other’s assessments, so where a client’s supplier onboarding runs through a different SSIP scheme, the registration should be accepted without a separate health and safety prequalification.