The RAF Verification Standard

This Standard defines what a Recycled AF Verified Statement is, the evidence required before one may issue, the classes of statement, and the limits of what a statement asserts. It applies to every statement issued by Recycled AF, whether under our own brand or through a licensed operator or fleet program.

A statement issued in conformance with this Standard records what was evidenced. It does not certify, accredit, or approve any organisation, and it does not discharge any party's own waste, container-deposit-scheme, or reporting obligations.

Every statement is built from two independent points of evidence with a reconciliation between them:

3.1 Point one (door-side) - all required

1. a.Photographic evidence of the CONTAINERS, contents visible - an open bin, bags in frame, containers identifiable. A closed lid is not evidence of containers.
2. b.A timestamp and geolocation captured at the premises.
3. c.Binding to one specific booking and premises.

3.2 Point two (depot-side) - all required for Counted class

1. a.A depot docket (number and/or docket photograph) for the lodgement the lot travelled in.
2. b.The docket's count and, where the depot provides it, the material split.

3.3 Custody - the closed-run rule

A lot qualifies for a per-premises count only if it remained identifiable from door to depot: it travelled as its own unit (its own lodgement and docket), or segregated within a closed run (tagged bags or physical separation), lodged in the same run it was collected in. Where separation cannot be maintained - for example a compacting vehicle tipping multiple premises' bins into one body - a per-premises count is physically unrecoverable and no statement may claim one (see Allocated class, s4).

If a statement does not say "independent depot count", it is not one. No blending of classes within a single figure is permitted.

1. a.Statements are issued only by Recycled AF. Each carries a unique statement number and resolves at a public verify URL.
2. b.A statement is a SNAPSHOT: its contents are fixed at issue and protected by an integrity fingerprint (cryptographic hash). An issued statement is never silently edited.
3. c.Corrections issue a NEW statement that supersedes the old. The old verify URL continues to resolve and states that it has been superseded, and by what.
4. d.Lifecycle: issued -> superseded or withdrawn. Withdrawal (for example, on post-issue review of the evidence) is a register status change, never a deletion.
5. e.VALIDITY IS REGISTER-ANCHORED: a statement is valid only while it appears on the Recycled AF verify register with a current status. A document that does not resolve on the register is not a Verified Statement, whatever it looks like.

We publish how the check works, not its thresholds. Disclosing exact tolerances would teach people how to sit inside them. The principles are public: estimates are never the verified number; the depot count replaces every estimate; variance between an estimate and a count is expected and screened for anomaly, not required to be zero; anomalies suspend issuance pending human review; and no statement issues through a failed check.

1. a.SNAPSHOT: a statement records the evidence captured for the identified collection at the time and place of that collection only. It is not continuous monitoring of any premises, organisation, or collector.
2. b.BENEFIT: a statement is issued to and for the party named on it, who is responsible for how it is used. Third parties receiving a statement take it subject to this Standard and the issuing terms.
3. c.SUPPLIED DATA: verification is only as good as the evidence captured; Recycled AF is not responsible for inaccuracies in information supplied by parties to the collection, and the provenance class states exactly which evidence stands behind the number.
4. d.ROLE: a statement does not certify an organisation, does not discharge any party's legal or reporting obligations, and does not constitute advice. How a statement is used within a customer's own sustainability reporting is a matter for the customer and its own assessor or auditor, subject to their requirements.
5. e.IMPARTIALITY: Recycled AF operates a collection marketplace and dispatches collectors. We do not claim third-party independence for our own dispatch operations. What is independent - and what this Standard is built on - is the SECOND POINT: the depot count is produced by scheme infrastructure that Recycled AF does not operate, on which refunds are paid. Statements assert that independence and no more.

1. a.The Recycled AF verified mark appears only on statements and reports issued by Recycled AF, and only while the underlying statement is current on the register. Any web or document use of the mark must accompany a live verify-register link.
2. b.Third parties (including licensees) may cite a Verified Statement only VERBATIM - the boxed statement panel with its statement number and verify URL. Recomputing, blending, or restating verified figures under the mark is prohibited. A number computed by anyone other than Recycled AF is not a verified number.
3. c.Use of the mark after suspension, withdrawal, or termination of the right to use it must cease immediately.

This Standard is versioned. Statements identify the Standard version they were issued under; a change to this Standard never retrospectively alters an issued statement. Material changes increment the version and are dated on the published page. Questions, disputes, and evidence-access requests: business@recycled-af.com.