Modeling of eddy current NDE applications can be a valuable support to performance demonstration involved in the formal qualification required by the regulation on the maintenance of nuclear power plants. Code validation is a prerequisite to its use in such a process. This situation has resulted in the past years in an important R&D effort, in order to develop the knowledge of the ability of simulation codes to address industrial testing issues. Specific benchmarks concerning nuclear NDE applications, such as steam generator tubes inspection, were designed and several codes were evaluated. Difficulties experienced with codes that had previously been validated on academic benchmarks from the literature showed the necessity to define, as a preceding stage, simple generic benchmarks focused on the industrial issue to check out the ability of an unknown code to address the application. This concern being shared by the whole French NDT community, a specific Working Group has been launched in the frame of COFREND, the French Association for NDE.