Scottish National Standards for Information and Advice Providers: a quality assurance framework

Passporting

These Standards recognise that many services may already be operating to other recognised management Standards. Where the service complies with other appropriate standards which are subject to external inspection or validation we provide a 'passport' * for that section in the 'Indicators' of these Standards. For example, '* IIP' means that services with Investors in People can be confident they are complying with this Standard.

The Standards continue to provide a 'passport' for SQMS, which was previously promoted by Scottish Enterprise. The external accreditation of compliance with SQMS ceased in 2006. For organisations whose external accreditation against this scheme is more than four years old this passport no longer exists. Unless the external accreditation of this scheme is reinstated this passport will be removed from future editions of the Standards.

In earlier editions of the Standards compliance with the Scottish Accessible Information Forum's Advice and Information for Disabled People's standards was accepted as a passport. As these standards are not subject to external inspection or validation this passport no longer exists. However, it should be noted that any evidence gathered to support compliance with the SAIF standards will support accreditation against these standards.

It is anticipated that passporting for certain standards will be extended to other externally inspected or validated standards over time to reduce the burden of regulation upon agencies whilst still assuring a quality service.