Certificate of Compliance vs. Conformance - What is the difference?

I just had a customer ask us to change our Certificate of Conformance to a Certificate of Compliance. This is a typical type of document that is quite commonly included with a shipment of product. Apparently there is thinking within their quality department that the term compliance is more correct. Can anyone explain if there is an actual distinction here other than personal preference? Thanks.

They mean the same thing. They both mean that the part complies or conforms to specifications.

In some sectors they are linked together as one form

LMU23 said:

I just had a customer ask us to change our Certificate of Conformance to a Certificate of Compliance. This is a typical type of document that is quite commonly included with a shipment of product. Apparently there is thinking within their quality department that the term compliance is more correct. Can anyone explain if there is an actual distinction here other than personal preference? Thanks.

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If it makes a difference to the customer, and isn't difficult for you to do, I would do it and get on with my life. The fact of the matter is that whether it's "compliance" or "conformance" matters not a bit because the documents themselves are, in general, legally worthless. It has long been a matter of established commercial law that the seller, by shipping product that has been sold under contract, is tacitly (and legally) "certifying" conformance to contractual requirements.

I agree with the foregoing.
I am notoriously persnickety when it comes to my own word use, but if I am sure I understand what the other guy means, I don't care which word of the following word sets he uses:

• conformance - conformity - compliance
• nonconformance - nonconformity - noncompliance

Heck! Most of them just use the initials "NC" and half couldn't tell me what the initials stand for.

Depending on whether the guy is a customer or a supplier, I do make a distinction between "continuous" and "continual" - I usually set the customer right and ignore what the supplier uses.

I don't even break out in hives anymore when a person says his company is "certified" to ISO9k2k versus ""registered" or "has a certificate of registration."

I really get excited, though, when somebody doesn't make a distinction between "inch-pound" or "centimeter-gram" units on an engineering drawing or inspection sheet.

My advice. Make a notation in customer's file to use a special template for his certificates. Do not change your entire system willy-nilly just to accommodate this customer - just consider it a "customer special requirement" unique to that customer.

Wes Bucey said:

My advice. Make a notation in customer's file to use a special template for his certificates. Do not change your entire system willy-nilly just to accommodate this customer - just consider it a "customer special requirement" unique to that customer.

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I think I might make an experiment out of it, if I had one form that I used for everyone. I would make the change across the board, and see if anyone else even noticed. I'd bet that no one would. Then, sometime in the future in casual conversation with the person who made the request, I would mention in passing that no one else had noticed the change. Not an in-your-face, HA HA I told you kind of thing, just something like, "When I made the change for you, I was worried that one of our other customers might object, but luckily, none of them did." This sends the subtle message that the change was pointless without offending the customer, and might make him think twice about such requests in the future.

JSW05 said:

I think I might make an experiment out of it, if I had one form that I used for everyone. I would make the change across the board, and see if anyone else even noticed. I'd bet that no one would. Then, sometime in the future in casual conversation with the person who made the request, I would mention in passing that no one else had noticed the change. Not an in-your-face, HA HA I told you kind of thing, just something like, "When I made the change for you, I was worried that one of our other customers might object, but luckily, none of them did." This sends the subtle message that the change was pointless without offending the customer, and might make him think twice about such requests in the future.

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It's easy enough to antagonize someone by accident. Why go out of your way to antagonize a customer by making him look foolish? My advice stands. Consider that if you change the format of ALL your CofC documents, you MAY tick off another customer, but the main problem is simply not knowing if anyone will call or have some problem with the new document. Sometimes, just sometimes, this "requirement" may change when the person who gave you this set of rules changes jobs.

Wes Bucey said:

I really get excited, though, when somebody doesn't make a distinction between "inch-pound" or "centimeter-gram" units on an engineering drawing or inspection sheet.

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This doesn't seem to bother NASA.

Wes Bucey said:

My advice. Make a notation in customer's file to use a special template for his certificates. Do not change your entire system willy-nilly just to accommodate this customer - just consider it a "customer special requirement" unique to that customer.

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This is what we do also. C of A, C of C, C of M - step right up, what do you want? If a customer does ask for something different then what we normally do (usually just a certificate of analysis), I always ask for details so they get exactly what they want and we don't have a long back-and-forth because we made an incorrect assumption.

Why not:

Al Rosen said:

Why not:

CERTIFICATE ​

of​

CONFORMANCE/COMPLIANCE/ANALYSIS​

or

CERTIFICATE​

of​

(check one)​

​

<>Conformance​

<>Compliance ​

<>Analysis ​

​

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If the teenagers in my neighborhood had a vote, it would be:

Wes Bucey said:

If the teenagers in my neighborhood had a vote, it would be:

Certificate of Whatever​

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Or in this instance: