Background
Lambda Calibration Limited is an independent privately owned UKAS accredited calibration laboratory and is managed by its three principle shareholders.
Founded in 1993 and based in the North West of England, Lambda was established with the buy-out of the then British Aerospace Defence calibration facility in Chorley, Lancashire. This laboratory had itself operated for many years as a Ministry of Defence centre of excellence for calibration and testing.
After the buy-out Lambda quickly established itself as an independent UKAS laboratory gaining an enviable portfolio of clients ranging from self employed electricians, through small owner managed engineering workshops to the well known large multi-national manufacturing corporations.
Though the company is now much larger, the qualities that underpinned its growth in the early years are as alive today as they were in the beginning...
Enthusiasm, technical excellence and a passionate commitment to unrivalled customer care.
Collection & Delivery
We provide a full UK mainland collection and delivery service to business premises, and from when we collect your equipment, to when we return it, it is insured against loss or damage.
Using our own transport
We offer free weekly collection and delivery using our own vans and drivers to business premises in the following postcode areas:
- BB
- BD
- BL
- CA
- CH
- CW
- FY
- HD
- HX
- L
- LA
- LS
- M
- OL
- PR
- SK
- ST
- TF
- WA
- WF
- WN
- WS
- WV
And offer limited, but still free, collection and delivery using our own vans and drivers in the following postcode areas:
- DE
- S
Because we use our own vans and drivers there is no need for you to package your equipment prior to collection.
Using an approved independent courier
If you fall outside of the above areas we can still arrange collection and delivery using our approved independent courier. The cost for this is as follows:
Collection from yourselves (up to 20kg) £19.00 + VAT
Delivery back to yourselves (up to 20kg) £12.00 + VAT
If you prefer to send the instruments to us yourself and just pay for the return carriage, this is not a problem.
Because we are not using our own vans and drivers you will have to ensure that your instruments are suitably protected and packaged prior to collection. If packaging is a problem, for a small fee we can provide customers with robust plastic transit crates. Please see the “Downloads” page of this website for details.
Domestic addresses
We do not normally collect from domestic addresses.
Delivery to domestic addresses would normally be by independent courier only and would be chargeable as above.
Turnaround
For items calibrated by ourselves our normal turnaround time is 5 working days. There will of course always be the occasional emergency and we make no extra charge for urgent turnaround. If we can possibly do it, we will, and we usually can.
Many of our competitors are simply not as good in this respect, especially if they are suppliers of specialist calibration services and have few competitors themselves. Any item that we have to subcontract will therefore, in most cases take longer.
Calibration Records & IMS
We operate a Filemaker database which tracks and controls all of the calibration work through our company. We can even import your own digitally stored calibration records onto our system, and break them down by department if you like. By doing so we can immediately begin to generate calibration recall reminders and calibration overdue reports for you.
In addition to this we provide a web based system (IMS) which gives you on-line access to your own calibration records. You can generate your own calibration recall reminders and calibration overdue reports from it, and even view or download your calibration certificates.
Calibration Recall & Overdue Reports
Our management information system will generate a timely reminder “Recall” when calibration is due. Such Recall notices are either posted or emailed (as a PDF) on a monthly basis, approximately 2- 3 weeks before the start of each month. At the same time an “Overdue” report is also generated, detailing items that have become overdue for calibration. For larger sites these reports can be emailed to the nominated contact for each department, and also copied to the nominated calibration co- ordinator or quality manager for the site.
Adjustments
Minor adjustments where possible, to bring an instrument back within specification are usually carried out free of charge. As are many minor repairs such as removal of burrs etc on mechanical instruments.
Some instruments requiring extensive or major adjustments may be treated as repairs but this work will be quoted for separately. Examples are instruments such as inside micrometers where the majority of the rods require adjustment, or instruments that can only be adjusted by the manufacturer using their own software. It must be stressed though that such instances are the exception rather than the rule.
Calibration Failures
Our usual procedure in the event of equipment failing calibration would be to issue a “Failure Notice” to the customer. The failure notice would include equipment details, nature of failure, price to repair or replace the item and an estimate of lead time.
The failure notice may be faxed or emailed.
There is a reply section where the customer is invited to sentence the equipment, Eg: Repair it, replace it, log as scrapped and return it, or log as scrapped and dispose of it. Once the customer has sentenced the equipment we will take the appropriate action.
If we do not receive a reply to a failure notice within 2 weeks we will usually send the instrument back to the customer with a “reject” label.
In cases where an instrument has to be sent to the manufacturer for evaluation a fee will usually be levied, though we would not proceed without first receiving permission.
Batteries & Fuses
If necessary, we will usually replace common inexpensive batteries or fuses within the standard calibration price providing the cost is less than 5% of the value of the calibration.
We reserve the right to charge for changing common inexpensive batteries and/or fuses if we consider the proportion of instruments requiring new batteries and/or fuses is unreasonably high. In such cases the charge for batteries or fuses will be £2.50 + VAT.
If special or rechargeable batteries need to be replaced we will treat this as a repair, and will seek your permission before proceeding.
Also, multi- meter fuses for example, vary enormously in price from a few pence each to several pounds depending on the type. If more expensive special fuses need to be replaced we will treat this as a repair, and will seek the your permission before proceeding.
Subcontracting
We are a broad based calibration laboratory with a huge range of facilities and more than 95% of the calibration work we do for our customers is done in-house by our own technicians. However, with many larger contracts there will be times when the calibration of specialist equipment has to be subcontracted to a specialist calibration laboratory.
We have a large database of approved suppliers and can make the process almost as seamless as if we were doing the work ourselves. The only difference you may notice is longer turnaround time.
Rest assured though, we do not subcontract calibration work without the knowledge of our customers; and we do not pass off another laboratory’s calibration results as our own.
Purchase Orders
Ideally, customers should raise an official purchase order detailing their requirements before we undertake any work. We do not normally undertake any work for a customer without either…
- An official purchase order. Or at the very least, a purchase order number.
- Some other written instruction to proceed. This can be faxed or emailed. If you like you can use the “Place an order” function on the “Contact” page of this website.
In the absence of the above you will be required to pay for the work prior to the return of your instruments.
For larger contracts, a limit of liability “call down” type purchase order would be the most efficient route. This type of purchase order would allocate an amount of money over a specific time period, say 1 year.
A specific amount of money can be allocated for calibration.
And a specific amount of money can be allocated for repairs, replacements and other adhoc work.
This negates the need to raise individual purchase orders to cover repairs etc, and thereby speeds up the work.
There is no need to worry about us invoicing against such purchase orders in an uncontrolled manner as we will still seek your permission before proceeding with the work.
You can authorise repairs or replacements by completing the reply section on our “Failure Notice”. To authorise other adhoc work or supply you can use the “Place an order” function on the “Contact” page of this website.