Why We've Been a Little Quieter: BMABA's Audit Season

Hi there,

You may have noticed over the last two to three weeks that the team here at BMABA, and our Senior Leadership Team in particular, have been a little harder to reach than usual. We wanted to take a moment to explain why, and to share something we're genuinely proud of in the process.

May is audit season at BMABA!

What that actually means

BMABA isn't a one-man band, and we're not making this up as we go along. As the professional standards body for the martial arts sector in the UK, we hold ourselves to exactly the kind of external scrutiny that you would expect from any serious governing body, and we think that matters.

Across any given year, our operations are formally audited and regulated by a number of qualified, reputable external organisations. These include UKAS-accredited certification bodies such as the British Assessment Bureau, who audit our Quality Management System against the international ISO 9001:2015 standard. They include CIMSPA, the chartered body for the sport and physical activity sector, with whom we hold Training Provider Partner status. They include the FCA-regulated framework that sits behind the insurance schemes we administer for our members. And they include the National Cyber Security Centre's Cyber Essentials programme, run by IASME on behalf of the UK Government.

Many of these audits, recertifications and surveillance reviews land in the same window each spring, which is why this time of year always involves a concentrated period of internal preparation and external assessment.

A quick milestone worth sharing

We're delighted to confirm that BMABA has just received its renewed certification under the Government's Cyber Essentials security programme. This is the recognised national standard for cyber security hygiene, and our continued certification means we've once again demonstrated that the technical controls protecting your data and our platforms meet the bar set by the NCSC.

It's not a flashy announcement, but it is an important one. The systems holding your membership records, your safeguarding documentation, your DBS data and your professional credentials are subject to real, independent scrutiny, and we think you deserve to know that.

This recertification also forms part of a broader development in our governance framework that we'll be sharing more about in due course. We don't want to give too much away yet, but it's a piece of work the SLT has been investing significant effort into, and we think members will be pleased with where it's heading.

Bear with us

As these audits continue over the coming weeks, you may find that responses from the team, particularly the SLT, take a little longer than you're used to. Email replies, governance queries, complex casework and strategic conversations may all run a touch slower until the audit window closes. Day-to-day member services, support tickets, certification processing and safeguarding matters will of course continue as normal.

We really appreciate your patience while we work through this.

It matters to us that when we ask our members to keep their qualifications current, their DBS checks valid, their first aid in date and their licences up to scratch, we're holding ourselves to the same standard. The audits we're going through right now are how we evidence that. We're being asked to check our own homework by people whose job it is to make sure governing bodies like ours are exactly what we say we are.

Thank you, as always, for being part of BMABA.