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Verifying Certificates during COVID-19

Wed, 25 November, 2020

COVID-19 hit the world like a sledgehammer. No country or business was prepared for the impact that the pandemic would have on their day to day operations. The lockdowns imposed in each country made sitting a CSWIP or BGAS-CSWIP exam impossible.  As a result, CSWIP had to act quickly to introduce measures that enabled our CSWIP and BGAS-CSWIP certificate holders to continue working under a valid certificate, but did not compromise the reliability and creditably of our certificates, nor call into question the integrity of the CSWIP name. 

CSWIP introduced a COVID-19 policy that enables certificate holders with a certificate due to expire between 01 March 2020 and 31 March 2021, at the recertification stage, to apply for a six (6) month extension to their certificate’s validity. This policy however, is not a simple ‘tick box’ exercise. Candidates must apply with evidence of relevant recent work experience and have an employer act as a verifier to their application; however, a new certificate with an updated expiry date is not issued.

While our policy enables a certificate holder to continue operating, it does not make it easy for an employer to know whether a certificate holder has a certificate with an approved extension, or if their extension request was rejected, or has simply expired. Therefore, we would like to emphasise the following to all employers or individuals responsible for checking the validity of a CSWIP or BGAS-CSWIP certificate:

All certificate holders who have successfully received an extension to the expiry date of their certificate (as a result of the COVID-19 policy) will have the expiry date of their certificate updated on the CSWIP verification website.

We strongly recommend anyone responsible for the review of CSWIP or BGAS-CSWIP certificates utilises the CSWIP verification page to confirm that a certificate is valid. Only certificates that have been granted an extension will have the new expiry date listed on the CSWIP verification page.

Going forward, once a certificate holder is successful in their recertification, the expiry date of their new certificate will be from the original expiry date of their old certificate, NOT the extension expiry date or from the date of their recertification examination depending on the rules of the scheme against which they are certified.

If you have any questions about the validity of a certificate, CSWIPs COVID-19 policy or an extension request please do not hesitate to contact us.

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