A Declaration of Conformity (DOC) covering all relevant directives is a fundamental part of the CE marking process. It explains what the CE markign means in the contect of the equipment which carries it. It also makes it clear who is taking legal responsbility for placing the CE marking on the equipment.

A DOC must be issued for any peice of equipment which carries a CE marking before it is placed on the EU market.

Machinery Directive 2006/42/EC requires that a copy of the DOC is included with the operator manual. Other Directives do not include a requirement for the DOC to be in the manual, but generally it is a good idea.

In MD the requirement for what is to be included in the manual is:-
Annex 1 1.7.4.2 (c) the EC declaration of conformity, or a document setting out the contents of the EC declaration of conformity, showing the particulars of the machinery, not necessarily including the serial number and the
signature;

If the DOC is provided on a separate piece of paper, for MD compliance the manual must include a section about the Declaration of Conformity, but it must be clear that the information in the manual is not the actual separate DOC. For example the section could be titled “Contents of the EC Declaration of Conformity” not “Declaration of Conformity”.

Harmonised Standards on DOCs

We would normally only quote C type standards on a DOC because if we start to quote all relevant B and A type standards, the list would be very long. If a B type standard is particularly relevant then we can include it, for example on machines with an electrical system we normally quote EN 60204-1.

Remember that if conformity is claimed with multiple directives all relevant primary standards should be included. For example, if conformity with EMC Directive is claimed, relevant EMC standards must be included, even if the main purpose of the DOC is conformity with MD.