These are six starting questions. They are not a readiness audit against the requirements of ISO 20121, and they are not a test you can pass. If every question has an answer, the status is questions answered. That means the questions have answers. It does not mean the system conforms, is ready, or has passed. A no answer is not a pass. The sheet cannot say certified.

ISO’s catalogue, opened 9 October 2026, lists ISO 20121:2024 as edition 2, published April 2024, at stage 60.60 on 3 April 2024. The same catalogue lists ISO 20121:2012 as withdrawn. The 2012 entry dates that withdrawal 3 April 2024. This page has not purchased the standard and does not quote it. If you need the requirements, obtain the text from ISO or a national standards body. Answering these questions does not do that for you.

ISO 14001 is a different standard. Use the ISO 14001 guide for an environmental management system. The event policy can be what you show for the policy question, and the post-event report can be what you show for the results question. Neither document satisfies the standard.

Answer six questions

The questions are:

  1. Which events would the system cover?
  2. Can you show a written policy?
  3. Is a person named for the work?
  4. Are results already kept separate from targets?
  5. Which conformity route have you chosen?
  6. Is the 2024 text in hand?

For questions 1 to 4 and question 6, the answer is yes, no, or not yet. For question 5, the answer is not chosen, self-declaration, a second-party check, or a third-party check. Those words are labels for your own note. They are not clause numbers.

Put the detail in the note. The scope note is where you name the events. A yes on the policy question means you can show the document, not that the document meets a standard. A no on the text question means the 2024 text is not in hand. That no is an answer. It is not a pass, and it does not become one if the other answers are filled in.

The status is questions incomplete while any answer is not yet, not chosen, or blank. It is questions answered only when all six have an answer other than those. Certified is not an allowed value.

You type the answers. The spreadsheet does not score them.

Fill in the sheet

Download both files. The blank file already contains the six prompts. Type the answers into a copy. Do not add clause numbers.

Worked example: questions incomplete

Northgate Studio is fictional. It can show a policy and has named a producer. The scope note says one annual supplier morning. Results are not yet separate from targets. No conformity route is chosen. The 2024 text is not in hand, so that answer is no.

The status is questions incomplete, because two answers are still open. The no on the text question is not a pass, and the sheet does not say the morning is certified.

If those two open answers were later filled, and the text answer stayed no, the status would be questions answered. That illustration is still only a description of the answers. It is not readiness, not conformity and not a pass. It is not a second file.

Limits

This page is not a reproduction of ISO 20121 and not a self-certification. The events guide keeps the short pointer to the current catalogue entry. The BS 8901 section of that guide was not rewritten here.

Sources