It’s not splitting hairs — this is a very different ethical situation. There’s a big gap between Janoshik allowing anyone who didn’t purchase a test to pay for a name change or buy a COA outright (without sending in a sample), versus Janoshik allowing the original test purchaser to pay for edits to the report header.
Janoshik already relies on the purchaser to provide the header info — name, product, quantity, source, etc. The lab doesn’t verify that data to my knowledge; they just receive it by email and then test the corresponding vial. In that context, charging a small fee to edit header details isn’t unethical. It’s actually mostly normal practice from a proofing perspective. The only data Janoshik certifies is the test results of what was in the vial they were sent.
But this also highlights why tests done by a lab or reseller aren’t really true third-party tests. The “third party” (the lab) isn’t choosing the sample — the vendor or client is. That means they could have a stockpile of product with variable purity and send only the one clean vial for testing. There’s a whole chain of unknowns between the lab, wholesaler, reseller, and you. So what does that COA really prove?
The only result that actually matters is the one from a sample you send, tested under your name. Even then, if you test one vial out of ten, all you know is that one vial is clean — not the rest. The ideal method would be to take a small portion from each vial and test either the combined sample or each one separately, though that’s probably not practical, possible or safe. If anyone’s found a safe, realistic way to do that, I’d love to hear it.
As for the report header itself — the lab will list whatever information you provide, and they’ll update it if you ask (unless they suspect something misleading or unethical, as I just noticed in their “more info” documentation; maybe I misunderstand that).
