Test Meter Achieves JOSCAR Registration

Written by Andy Street

Test Meter has officially achieved JOSCAR registration, strengthening our ability to support organisations operating across defence, aerospace, security and critical national infrastructure.

In high stakes engineering, a supply chain failure rarely remains confined to the purchasing department. A delayed instrument can hold up commissioning. An expired calibration certificate can prevent projects from being deployed. An unreliable measurement can undermine an inspection, create an audit issue or force important work to stop. For procurement and engineering teams, supplier selection is therefore considerably more than just finding the correct product at the correct price.

JOSCAR provides a shared supplier platform for organisations such as the Ministry of Defence, BAE Systems, Leonardo, QinetiQ and Thales. Hellios currently describes the wider JOSCAR community as comprising of more than 30 buyers and over 6,000 suppliers.

It's About Establishing Trust

That trust must be supported by evidence. Through controlled processes, reliable supplier information, financial and operational resilience, cybersecurity awareness, quality management and the ability to keep critical equipment available when it is needed. That's why I am proud to confirm that Test Meter is now registered on JOSCAR (the Joint Supply Chain Accreditation Register), administered by Hellios.

More Than A Compliance Exercise

For Test Meter, completing the registration process means that our required supplier information has been validated and made available through a recognised industry platform. This matters because conventional supplier onboarding can be repetitive and time consuming. Teams frequently collect similar information covering company structure, risk, capability, compliance and supporting documentation from multiple prospective suppliers.

Suppliers, meanwhile find themselves responding to variations of the same questions every time they engage with a new organisation. JOSCAR creates a more consistent approach. Hellios collects and validates supplier information, maintains it through the online portal and makes the relevant data accessible to participating buyers. The purpose is not to make purchasing decisions on behalf of those organisations, but to give them a stronger and more consistent evidence base from which to conduct their evaluations. 

This is our commitment to being a capable, transparent and dependable supply chain partner.

Supply Chain Assurance Is Now An Operational Requirement

The strategic importance of supplier assurance has increased significantly. Procurement teams are no longer only being asked whether a supplier can provide a product. They must also understand whether the supplier can protect sensitive information, maintain service continuity, meet quality expectations, respond to disruption and support the organisation throughout the working life of its assets. 

This is particularly important in test and measurement. As an instrument may represent a relatively small part of the overall value of a project, but its availability and accuracy can determine whether much larger assets, systems or facilities are permitted to proceed into service. A missing tester, damaged thermal camera or overdue calibration can delay hundreds of people whose work depends on that instrument. The commercial cost of the equipment itself can quickly become insignificant compared with the cost of interrupted operations. The solution therefore needs to move beyond product transactions.

The real question is: How do you keep your equipment accurate, compliant, documented and available across its entire service life?

This is where Test Meter can provide value beyond supplying the instrument itself.

Reducing Procurement Friction

JOSCAR registration gives participating buyers access to validated supplier information through an established system. It does not remove an organisation’s responsibility to conduct its own commercial, technical or security evaluation. Nor does it guarantee that a supplier will be appointed. What it can do is reduce unnecessary repetition and give your team a clearer starting point. Rather than building the supplier profile from the ground up, buyers can access centrally managed information designed around the requirements of the industry.

Protecting Mission-Critical Instrumentation

Supply chain assurance must ultimately translate into performance on the ground. Test Meter provides calibration and repair services, to support customers throughout the UK, using manufacturer-approved procedures and parts where applicable. We can provide online access to calibration certificates, scheduled reminders, fixed repair arrangements and inventory held to support faster repairs or equipment swaps.

These capabilities allow us to develop service agreements around the operational needs of our customers rather than forcing everyone into the same process.

• For a business managing a nationwide engineering workforce, the requirement might be decentralised collection and return logistics.
• For a manufacturing site, it could be a carefully controlled calibration schedule designed around planned shutdowns.
• For a critical facility, it may involve maintaining backup equipment so that essential testing can continue while primary instruments are being calibrated or repaired.

The objective in every case: reduce avoidable downtime without compromising measurement confidence.

Audit Ready Measurement

In high risk environments, measurement results must be defensible. The instrument must be appropriate for the application. Its condition and calibration status must be understood. Supporting documentation must be accessible. The operator must also be competent to use it correctly and interpret the results.

No supplier or instrument manufacturer can guarantee compliance in isolation. Compliance depends on the complete testing process, including equipment selection, calibration, procedures, documentation and user competence. A responsible supplier should therefore do more than dispatch a product. It should help customers select the appropriate equipment, understand its limitations, maintain it correctly and retain the records required to demonstrate control.

Test Meter is accredited to ISO 9001:2015 and works with a broad portfolio of established manufacturers. This combination allows us to support both the immediate requirement for instrumentation and the longer-term management of the asset.

From Equipment Supplier to Strategic Fleet Partner

Our JOSCAR registration demonstrates our intention to work closely with procurement, engineering, quality and asset management teams responsible for complex or business critical instrumentation fleets. The strongest supplier relationships in these sectors are not built around isolated purchases. They are built around visibility, responsiveness and shared responsibility for operational continuity. That means understanding:

• Which instruments are deployed and where
• When each asset is due for calibration
• What equipment is critical to continued operations
• Where replacement or backup instruments may be required
• How documentation can be retrieved during an audit
• How servicing can be scheduled without interrupting essential work
• How total asset cost can be reduced over the full operating life of the equipment.

These are fleet management questions, not simply product questions. They require technical knowledge, logistics, service capacity and close communication between the supplier and the customer.

A Stronger Future For Partnerships

I would like to thank everyone within Test Meter who contributed to the JOSCAR registration process. Achieving registration required collaboration across the business and reflects the standards our team works to maintain every day. But the real value of this achievement will be measured by what follows. It gives us a stronger foundation from which to build relationships with organisations operating in the UK’s most demanding industries. It also gives prospective customers greater visibility of our capabilities and a more efficient way to begin evaluating us as a potential supplier.

Talk to Test Meter

Are you responsible for procuring test and measurement equipment, managing an instrument fleet or coordinating calibration across defence, aerospace, security or critical infrastructure operations? You can find Test Meter Group Ltd through the Hellios JOSCAR portal or contact our expert technical team to discuss:

• Test and measurement equipment procurement
• Calibration and repair programmes
• Equipment hire and contingency requirements
• Instrument fleet management
• Nationwide logistics and service agreements
• Technical support and training

Speak to Test Meter about building a more reliable, visible and operationally resilient test equipment fleet. For more information please contact us on 0113 248 9966 or email sales@test-meter.co.uk.