The NEBOSH Certificate is at level 3 in the National Qualification Framework, and is accredited by QCA, CEA and ACCAC.

The NEBOSH National General Certificate is not a qualification for Occupational Health and Safety Practitioners (OHASPs). However the National General Certificate, or an equivalent level 3 qualification, satisfies the entry requirements for the level 4 Diploma in occupational Health and Safety Practice, details of which are available in a separate publication.

The award of the NEBOSH National General Certificate does not imply that the holder is a competent person within the meaning of this term in regulation 7 of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999. Competence requires the appropriate application of knowledge and understanding through experience of tackling real issues at work. Rather, the NEBOSH National General Certificate provides a broad (but not deep) base of knowledge on which a basic level of competence in occupational safety and health – appropriate to a nonspecialist– can be developed. The level of competence in occupational safety and health required by an individual depends on a range of factors including the nature and magnitude of the risks he or she is to deal with and whether or not there is access to more competent sources of advice.

The guidance of the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), or a professional occupational health and safety practitioner (a Corporate Member of the Institution of Occupational Safety and Health), should be sought if there is any doubt about the level of health and safety competence to which an organisation (or any part of it) should have access.

Standards on ‘Health and Safety for People at Work’, consisting of eight standalone units, were developed in 1998 by the Employment National Training Organisation (ENTO) for people who needed the competence to fulfil specific health and safety responsibilities in the workplace but who were not OHASPs. The National General Certificate syllabus was revised in 2002 to ensure a closer match with the underpinning knowledge for these eight standalone units. Shortly after the publication of the new syllabus, the ENTO units were launched collectively as a single, level 3 standard for those with health and safety functions at a non--professional level. Hence, the Certificate now addresses the underpinning knowledge for this level 3 standard and is assessed at that level. The National General Certificate has also been adopted by ENTO and the Scottish National Training Organisation (SCONTO) as the Technical Certificate for the Advanced Modern Apprenticeship in Occupational Safety and Health Practice.

Because the NEBOSH National General Certificate is a vocationally-related award, it would not be meaningful to compare its standard with that of academic qualifications such as the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) or Alevel. A better comparison would probably be to say that the NEBOSH National General Certificate is examined at a level broadly similar to an Edexcel (formerly BTEC) National Certificate. However, the duration of training for the NEBOSH National General Certificate, at 87 hours, is considerably less than that required for an Edexcel National Certificate.

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