Certificates and Verification

This page explains what a Shog Corporate Training certificate is, what it proves, what it deliberately does not prove, and how anyone can check one. It is for certificate holders, for the employers who buy the training, and for third parties asked to rely on a certificate.

What a certificate contains

A certificate is issued when a learner passes the assessment for a course against the pass mark stated for that course. It carries:

• a certificate number, unique to that certificate;
• the course title, and the module set as it stood on the day it was issued;
• the language version taken, Arabic or English;
• the score achieved;
• the issue date;
• an expiry date, 12 months after issue;
• the organisation the learner was enrolled by.

The module set is recorded as a snapshot. Courses are revised over time, so a certificate says which version of the course was taken, not what the course happens to contain today. That is deliberate: an auditor asking what somebody was actually taught in March gets the March answer.

Each course is authored twice, independently, in Arabic and in English. A certificate records which of the two the learner took.

What a certificate asserts

A certificate is evidence that a named person, enrolled by a named organisation, completed a specific version of a specific course, and scored a stated result against a stated pass mark, on a stated date.

Behind it sits an identity step. At completion, the learner either has a photograph taken through their browser or signs an identity declaration. That evidence is held with the completion record, in the organisation's own storage where it has connected one, and it is what supports the claim that the person named is the person who did the work.

That is the whole of the claim.

What a certificate does not assert

This section matters more than the one above, and we would rather be blunt about it than let a certificate be relied on for something it was never meant to carry.

It is not an accreditation. The course is not accredited by any accreditation body, and the certificate does not carry the endorsement of one. If you need a course accredited by a named body, this is not that.

It is not a licence, permit or professional registration. It does not qualify anybody to practise anything, it does not satisfy a licensing authority on its own, and it does not replace a permit, a card or a registration issued by a regulator or an authority.

It is not a statement that a legal obligation has been discharged. Whether a particular training duty applying to an employer is satisfied by a particular course is the employer's assessment to make, in consultation with its own advisers and its own regulator. We provide training and the evidence that it was taken.

It is not a statement that the employer's own site-specific instructions were given. This is the one that catches people out with health and safety. A health and safety course teaches general subject matter. It says nothing about the induction for a particular site, the risk assessment for a particular task, the emergency arrangements at a particular building, or the safe operating procedure for a particular machine. Those are the employer's to deliver, to record and to prove. A certificate from us is not evidence that they happened.

It is not a competence assessment. Passing an assessment shows that a learner answered enough questions correctly on the day. It is not an observation of practical competence and it is not a statement that the person is safe or capable in a live setting.

It is not a statement about the person beyond that course. It says nothing about their conduct, their other qualifications or their suitability for a role.

It does not expire silently into validity. After 12 months the certificate is expired. It remains a true record that the training was taken on the issue date, but it should not be relied on as current training. Retake the course to obtain a current certificate.

How verification works

Every certificate can be checked at the verification page, using the certificate number, at the address printed on the certificate in the form /verify/{number}.

No account is needed. That is by design. A client, an auditor, a regulator or a prospective employer can check a certificate without asking anybody for access.

Verification reads the certificate record held in the issuing organisation's database. It does not read the certificate file. That is why a certificate stays verifiable even when the file has been moved, renamed or placed beyond our reach in the organisation's own storage. A document that cannot be opened is never mistaken for a certificate that was never earned, and the reverse is equally true.

What the public page shows, and what it does not

The verification page shows:

• the certificate number;
• the course title;
• the name of the organisation;
• the issue date;
• the expiry date;
• the status: valid, expired or revoked.

The verification page does not show the learner's name. It does not show their email address, their phone number, their score, their assessment answers, their identity photograph or their signature.

This is a deliberate trade. Someone holding a certificate number can confirm that the certificate is genuine, current and issued by the organisation it claims, without learning who the individual is from a public page. To connect a certificate to a person, compare the number on the document in front of you with the number on the page. The document names the person; the public record confirms the document.

If you need confirmation of the individual, ask the employer that issued the enrolment. The employer holds the full record and can produce it.

Validity and renewal

A certificate is valid for 12 months from its issue date, after which the verification page reports it as expired.

We do not extend a certificate, and we do not re-date one. A learner who needs current training retakes the course and receives a new certificate with a new number, a new issue date and a fresh 12-month validity. The earlier certificate remains in the record as an accurate statement of what happened at that time.

Whether 12 months is the right refresh interval for your obligations is your assessment. Some duties expect more frequent training, and some expect less.

Revocation

A certificate can be revoked. A revoked certificate shows as revoked on the public verification page, and the reason is not published there.

Grounds for revocation include:

• the assessment was taken by somebody other than the person named;
• the identity evidence behind the completion is false, substituted or belongs to another person;
• the completion record was obtained by manipulating progress or assessment data, or by any route that did not involve doing the course;
• the certificate was issued as the result of a platform error, for example the wrong course version, the wrong pass mark or the wrong person;
• the issuing organisation asks us to revoke it and gives a reason;
• the certificate has been altered or forged.

Where we intend to revoke, we tell the issuing organisation and, where practical, give it the opportunity to respond first. Revocation for an error of ours is corrected by issuing a replacement certificate that states the position accurately.

An organisation cannot revoke another organisation's certificate.

Reporting a suspected forgery

If a certificate you have been shown does not match what the verification page says, or you believe a document has been altered, tell us.

Write to training@shogconsulting.com with:

• the certificate number as printed on the document;
• a copy or photograph of the document you were shown;
• the organisation named on it;
• what does not match, and how you came by the document.

We will check the record, tell you whether the certificate is genuine, and where a document has been forged we will inform the organisation named on it. We will not disclose the learner's personal details to you in the process; confirming or denying that a certificate is genuine is what we can do.

If the verification page reports "not found", the most common cause is a mistyped number. Check the number first, and then report it.

Questions

Write to training@shogconsulting.com. Shog Corporate Training is operated by Shog Consulting (FZC), licence SC242038101, STRIP Block C VL07-017, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates.