Intertek, announces the expansion of the Lighting General Coverage Program to include a larger scope of LED products. The expansion gives manufacturers of lighting projects for the hospitality industry a product certification alternative for LED luminaires, resulting in a quicker, more efficient time to market for a wider variety of products. This marks the latest of several LED expansions the company has made, including the 2015 launch of its Class P program, which defines evaluation and testing guidelines for standardized LED driver constructions and ratings.

Members of the Lighting General Coverage Program can use NRTL-certified components to design and manufacture luminaires. Under the expansion, LED luminaires using four new categories of sources are now eligible for use in the program: NRTL-certified Zhaga Book 7 modules using a Class P driver; NRTL-certified functional safety modules using a Class P driver; NRTL-listed or –classified linear fluorescent LED tube replacement; and NRTL-classified retrofit kits.

“At Intertek, one of our priorities is helping manufacturers get certified products to market as quickly and efficiently as possible, but until now, we were not able to offer our customers the opportunity to certify LED luminaires through our General Coverage Program,” said Carl Bloomfield, Lighting Global Business Line Leader for Intertek. “The success of our Class P offering allowed us to expand our existing General Coverage Program to now include certain LED luminaires, reducing costs and cutting turnaround times to give our customers more control in the product release cycle.”

Intertek’s Lighting General Coverage Program allows manufacturers to use listed components or other components identified by Intertek for products that are temperature exempt. Intertek trains qualified representatives of a lighting manufacturer on how to comply with construction requirements of applicable standards. In turn, manufacturers can certify large numbers of products through a more cost-effective and timely process, allowing models within specific product families to be designed with approved components and shipped without having individual samples sent for off-site testing and certification. Clients in the program undergo an initial factory inspection, monthly inspections, annual retention requirements and are subject to monthly factory audits where applicable.

Intertek offers a range of quality, safety, performance, regulatory compliance, labelling, and advisory services for LED products including modules, arrays, lamps, luminaires, and lighting controls. As the industry-leading assurance, testing, inspection and certification company for lighting products, Intertek can provide the most comprehensive quality assurance solutions across the largest global footprint. Intertek services help to ensure the safety and performance of lighting products – including testing the veracity of claims of energy efficiency or environmental impact. Lighting products can receive Intertek’s ETL Mark, which proves compliance to all requisite North American safety standards, as well as the CE mark or equivalent marks for other global markets. For more information, visit www.intertek.com/lighting.