GPSR Compliance

[bojangled]

This is as clear as mud to me. Been to the gov. advice website and various others.
How does a 1972 poster fit in to this process?

It's not an exempt category. 

Advise buyers this item is for viewing only ? 

My initial reaction, sadly, to to switch EU and NI off. 
Jo

[4_bathrooms]

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@spence0175 wrote:

Does the EU have to comply with the same rules if importing into the uk.

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No, they don't.

From December the UK's Great Britain's UKCA mark was going to become mandatory for any goods requiring compliance checks that were to be placed on the GB market - i.e. after December the CE mark would no longer be recognised in Great Britain. The situation was/is a bit more complicated in Northern Ireland as NI remains in the EU's customs union as per the Northern Ireland Protocol (Windsor Framework). Goods placed on the NI market will be able to have either just a CE mark (EU certification body) or CE and UKNI marking (UK certification body).

However, in August last year - following several prior extensions - the previous Government announced that CE marking would continue to be recognised indefinitely. This means EU businesses and consumers can continue to place CE compliant goods on the UK market without any restrictions nor any additional compliance checks required.

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@spence0175 wrote:

Same with the green rules into Germany. Are we charging them to dispose of packaging when they send to us...

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This all stems from the EU's Packaging Directive. We do have legislation stemming from that Directive but the thresholds for registration are quite high; i.e. the producer must have a turnover of £2M and handled 50 tonnes of packaging or packaging materials in a year.

As an interesting aside eBay is obliged to check sellers comply with the German Packaging Act but does not charge eBay.de's sellers a "regulatory operating fee"... 

[alijohn499]

Hi, I only sell to the UK so am I correct in thinking this new legislation won't apply to me?

[billythecardy]

It will if you sell to Northern Ireland, as they are part of the EU customs
union.

I’m pretty sure the good people of NI are going to be pretty annoyed about
this.

[555njp]

My understanding is you are ok if you tick NI as one of the places you do not ship to.

EBay however may well take on a different view or be asking for ALL listings to be compliant.

I haven't tested it yet and want to retain NI as long as possible.
I'm sure there'll come a point soon when it's forced rather than requested (as at present) in readiness for the end of December deadline 🤨

[ojewellery]

For non CE marked products,  Trying to see the wood for the trees, I think what I'm reading is we need four things. 

1) A unique product identifier - i.e. create a unique part number or an EAN,

2) An address for either the manufacturer or person making product available on the market - which could be are own name/ address/ contact details as per current business seller requirements,

3) A set of instructions for safe product use.   Which for a simple product is pretty much the item description and intended use from the listing.

4) A name and address for someone in Europe/ NI who will act in the role of economic operator for the purposes of General Product Safety Requirements (GPSR) which essentially means should the product ever be subject to a recall, they will upload the recall notice to the relevant EU platform for recall notices.

Seams like a massive business opportunity for someone in NI to set up as an Economic operator and reap a decent living by creating an app that charges a nominal amount per database entry into an intermediary database that can then be used should a recall ever happen!

I should imagine it could end up being like the situation for the poor chap in a flat in South Wales who had over 30,000 Chinese sellers using his address for VAT registration.  All that is required is a name and address.

[4_bathrooms]

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@ojewellery wrote:

Seams like a massive business opportunity for someone in NI to set up as an Economic operator and reap a decent living by creating an app that charges a nominal amount per database entry into an intermediary database that can then be used should a recall ever happen!

The economic operator is held entirely liable by the EU should there be any safety issue, incident or any other non-compliance issue - forseeable or not - with the goods they are identified as being the economic operator for. In other words the economic operator is the whipping boy should anything go wrong. As per the EU's factsheet:

"Providing for penalties that are serious enough that they can discourage business from not respecting
their product safety obligations"

The above emphasis is quoted verbatim.     

[ojewellery]

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@4_bathrooms wrote:

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economic operator is held entirely liable by the EU should there be any safety issue, incident or any other non-compliance issue - forseeable or not - with the goods they are identified as being the economic operator for. In other words the economic operator is the whipping boy should anything go wrong. As per the EU's factsheet:

"Providing for penalties that are serious enough that they can discourage business from not respecting
their product safety obligations"

The above emphasis is quoted verbatim.     

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I wasn't meaning to sound quite so glib - its frustration.

Lets go back to our early thread printed book/ poster examples.  Our whipping boy (Economic Operator -EO) who is taking on all the risk of consumer paper cuts from said books and as yet unknown carcinogens in the printing ink, would have their own risk assessments to take on for the non CE marked products that they agreed to be EO for.  I'm not suggesting that they allow nuclear weapons for domestic use onto a database.  Isn't it effectively an insurance underwriting cost, some products/ areas are much higher risk and administrative overhead than others?  For most sellers on this thread they will never be involved in any form of product recall. 

Doesn't almost everything come down to money?  There will (hopefully) ultimately be services that will facilitate selling of goods into the EU - supply and demand.  

I like this paragraph, some practical guidelines feel rather overdue about now:

My calendar note is set for end of November 24, which gives me two weeks to act or flick the EU and NI off switch.  I can't see the point in switching off earlier and this level of crazy has to have some form of workaround.

[bzmotman]

"this level of crazy has to have some form of workaround."

Everything I have seen refers to Businesses which implies that private sellers are not going to be affected -certainly I've not received anything on my private account. If correct then perhaps I should migrate my regular EU buyers onto my private account.

I've seen on another thread that Amazon have announced that GPSR will not apply to Amazon.UK stores but will to .de .fr etc. Could it be that Ebay are using a sledgehammer to crack a nut. If something is listed on UK is it deemed as being offered for sale to the EU even if a European postage rate is quoted. I thought that somewhen in the past there was great hoo-ha about some new regulation and it turned out that it only affected UK sellers who also offered their products directly on an Ebay site within the EU. Could the same apply here?

Apologies if this post is a load of ******* but I've got a dose of Covid so thinking may not be entirely straight.

[ojewellery]

@bzmotman , sorry to hear about the Covid - I remember covid brain fog all to well.

I really hope there is something in your theory - sometimes the simplest solution is the best.  I'll have a good puruse of the Amazon forums and announcements later and see what I can find.

[fatbobfan]

November 24th sounds a perfect plan, however

I had a Compliance Document request end of May, couldnt supply the signed Declaration of Conformity and test reports by 6th June, I removed the listing (ended) to do the right thing but Ebay then removed for a policy violation. 

Further inventory was also chosen, ended and again removed for a policy violation, I couldnt supply the docs, I resell, the manufacturers (and I did try) would never give me the docs, its not in their interest, they want the business. 

I took action and stopped selling to the EEA+NI, my inventory was not targeted, however this means (very bloomin unfairly imo) Im loosing business for 5 months and within 3 days I had an EU email asking to buy. Yet my comprtitors are still selling, 2 of the lines removed are being sold to the EU by my competitors, Fair?

Its a risk, sell EU and risk inventory being removed if your category/inventory is targeted and you cant supply the docs. 

Even not selling in EEA and NI the removed listings are not available to me, sales history lost (advised this by CS), unable to relist or sell similar will have to be photographed again, that is if CS can actually tell me its OK to do so and guess what no one knows....

Mentioning as to some Sales History is very important, as are photographs even more so if professionally done, 

No warning other than the prepare for GPSR December 13th, and again the same today!! perhaps have a plan just in case.

[555njp]

That doesn't sound good. I wonder how many businesses will be stating "Sorry, due to the EU GPSR compliance ruling, from the end of December 2024 we will no longer be selling any of our items to buyers residing in the EU or NI. Sorry for any inconvenience."

Quite a few of my listings say will post to UK only, guess that'll be GB only soon.

[4_bathrooms]

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@ojewellery wrote:

I like this paragraph, some practical guidelines feel rather overdue about now:

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I agree, some clear guidance from the EU itself is required. Reading the regulations there are many seemingly contradictory statements about whether goods that do not require CE (or other EU harmonisation) markings are actually covered by the remit of the regulations or not.  

[fatbobfan]

I am right in thinking this is not just a UK and EU thing

This is ROW and EU

[ojewellery]

Online marketplaces have always been interesting in the area of where a sale takes place.  I know the EU tried to make it that its where the consumer is when they make the purchase thats relevant, but Amazon don't appear to be taking that stance.

[ojewellery]

EU taking on Rest Of World, with NI caught in cross fire!

[mrob7487]

I sell vintage jewellery and accessories & this would be almost impossible to comply with. In regards to the signed pieces most companies closed down decades ago and for pieces that are unsigned I have no idea who the manufacturers are. Luckily I sell very little to the EU & NI (in the last 12 month less than a dozen sales) so removing them won't affect me much at all. I removed the EU from Etsy when the ioss system and then the packaging act were introduced and it had very little effect. I do feel sorry for sellers who sell large amounts to the EU though as this looks like it's going to be an absolute nightmare.

[4_bathrooms]

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@fatbobfan wrote:

I am right in thinking this is not just a UK and EU thing

This is ROW and EU

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Correct, the EU hasn't singled out the UK. However, the UK is uniquely affected as part of the UK (Northern Ireland) remains in the EU's customs union due to the (now stupid looking) Northern Ireland protocol.

The idea behind the protocol was there would be a "green lane" for goods sent from Great Britain to end-consumers in Northern Ireland. These regulations and the related CE/UKNI/UKCA compliance saga have now made a complete mockery of that idea.

Whilst the EU introduces ever-increasing protectionist measures like this - that affect all non-EU/EEA established sellers - something desperately needs to be done about the Northern Ireland protocol. This will effectively leave Northern Ireland and Great Britain treating each other as third-countries for anything other than food, medicines and living organisms. 

[Anonymous]

Well, I've done my little bit and emailed Gavin Robinson leader of the DUP with a link to today's Tamebay article about the GPSR. When the mainstream media latch onto this over here, there will be bedlam.

"something desperately needs to be done about the Northern Ireland protocol. This will effectively leave Northern Ireland and Great Britain treating each other as third-countries for anything other than food, medicines and living organisms."

I agree.

[camerapartsuk]

The way they got round sending GB sausages to NI was to simply put stickers on packs stating they were not for EU consumption.

We may be able to do something similar stating not to be distributed to the EU, only NI.

This obviously doesn't help sending to the EU, but might save sending to NI, especially as you can send to NI using bog standard Royal Mail.

[Anonymous]

We may be able to do something similar stating not to be distributed to the EU, only NI.

I am a member of the UK internal market scheme and that does similar, guaranteeing no onward movement of goods into the EU / Republic of Ireland. Saying that, it's not much use if my GB suppliers no longer want to supply me in December.