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View Full Version : Regulatory compliance (RANT)



Airbozo
11-23-2010, 07:34 PM
I haven't ranted in a while. Mainly because I have been too busy to even have a rant despite many issues.

Today's rant: Regulatory compliance.

I have been tasked by one of our large customers to provide them with proof of regulatory compliance for several power supplies used in servers and workstations we supply them.

You would think this would be an easy thing since this proof of conformance is required by almost every major industry for off the shelf parts. Not so. It is like pulling teeth to get this information. If I can find it on my own, it is either way out of date or completely inaccurate.

I have been working on this since July and out of 6 companies only ONE has even had the decency to respond with the correct info. That was Antec and they responded within 12 hours with the exact document I needed. SuperMicro? Nothing, and we are a rather large partner of theirs too. Dell? hahah forget it. They tell me to look on their website but can not provide me a link to the _correct_ information. All I can find is out dated certifications or only certifications for current models. Cisco so far has not responded to me with anything but questions and invalid info.

Zippy Technology (I kid you not, it is a real company that makes power supplies) so far has not responded despite half a dozen emails. I tried calling once, but Mandarin is not my native language... lol

OK, more to rant about, but ran out of time....

BTW: It may mean nothing, but the standard I am trying to verify is IEC 60950-1 2nd edition.

Kayin
11-23-2010, 07:40 PM
Tried contacting Zippy through Emacs?

Airbozo
11-23-2010, 08:04 PM
Tried contacting Zippy through Emacs?

lol, not even sure what that means.

My head hurts over this project and I am officially giving up at the end of the month and sending back this project to the customer as incomplete. They have a whole Regulatory Compliance department there that _should_ be taking care of this.

Now I find out that as of 2 weeks ago they are requiring us to HiPot test all of their systems. (even though everything is off the shelf parts already subject to hipot testing...) :headshake:

Oneslowz28
11-23-2010, 08:08 PM
Sounds like one big headache...

Airbozo
11-23-2010, 08:19 PM
Sounds like one big headache...

This project is one of the reasons I have been silent here the last few weeks. It's only getting busier.

Oneslowz28
11-23-2010, 08:35 PM
I went through my contact list for you and I only have Antec's and you already got their info. Sorry I couldn't help more.

BuzzKillington
11-23-2010, 09:19 PM
I wonder if you lost a client do to these companies negligence, is it lawsuit worthy? That'll light a fire under their ass I bet.

Konrad
11-24-2010, 04:27 AM
Why aren't the usual compliance marks on the PSUs (and UL lookups) good enough?

Airbozo
11-24-2010, 10:59 AM
I wonder if you lost a client do to these companies negligence, is it lawsuit worthy? That'll light a fire under their ass I bet.

I've already threatened to go somewhere else with our business. Not lawsuit worthy since it comes down to choice. We choose to do business with them or not. The only thing I have behind me is the FDA. If these companies want to ignore me that's fine. Come December 2nd all power supplies without this IEC conformance are no longer allowed in any device used by the medical industry. It's a pretty big industry too with lots of money to spend right now. Just sucks that now we may have to halt production on a few devices while our customer specs out new psu's.


Why aren't the usual compliance marks on the PSUs (and UL lookups) good enough?

This is where most people in this industry are confused. The marks are fine for a quick verification, but the FDA (and our customer) require the specific CB sheet indicating the results of the tests for this 2nd generation specification, which you have to pay a couple hundred dollars to even read...(don't get me started on that issue...)