ISO 37001:2016 - Anti-bribery management Systems

ISO 37001:2016 specifies requirements and provides guidance for establishing, implementing, maintaining, reviewing and improving an anti-bribery management system.

The system can be stand-alone or can be integrated into an overall management system. ISO 37001:2016 addresses the following in relation to the organization's activities:

• bribery in the public, private and not-for-profit sectors;
• bribery by the organization
• bribery by the organization's personnel acting on the organization's behalf or for its benefit;
• bribery by the organization's business associates acting on the organization's behalf or for its benefit;
• bribery of the organization;
• bribery of the organization's personnel in relation to the organization's activities;
• bribery of the organization's business associates in relation to the organization's activities;
• direct and indirect bribery (e.g. a bribe offered or accepted through or by a third party).

ISO 37001:2016 is applicable only to bribery. It sets out requirements and provides guidance for a management system designed to help an organization to prevent, detect and respond to bribery and comply with anti-bribery laws and voluntary commitments applicable to its activities.

ISO 37001:2016 does not specifically address fraud, cartels and other anti-trust/competition offences, money-laundering or other activities related to corrupt practices, although an organization can choose to extend the scope of the management system to include such activities.

The requirements of ISO 37001:2016 are generic and are intended to be applicable to all organizations (or parts of an organization), regardless of type, size and nature of activity, and whether in the public, private or not-for-profit sectors. The extent of application of these requirements depends on the factors specified in 4.1, 4.2 and 4.5.

For TUV HELLAS ISO 37001:2016 certification forms part of the SYSTEM CERTIFICATION strategy to widen the range of certifications offered in Greece and internationally.

Since the beginning of the year has completed all the necessary steps (procedures, documentation, etc.) for its accreditation by the national Greek Accreditation Body ESYD and relevant accreditation is expected to be received by end of October 2017.

To date TUV HELLAS has carried out a number of audits under ISO 37001 for large organisations and has issued the respective certificates.

At the same time, TUV HELLAS is planning a 2 day support training programme that can be held in Greek or in English which will be open to businesses and organisations which want to implement an antibribery system according to the ISO 37001 standard. The programme will give them the opportunity to better understand the requirements of the standard.