Do you sell on any marketplaces like eBay or Amazon in Europe? The new General Product Safety Regulation EU (GPSR) brings significant changes you need to know. From mandatory Responsible Persons to enhanced product traceability and safety obligations. Here’s a quick rundown of what’s new and how to stay compliant.
Requirements GPSR: General Overview
Product legislation establishes the legal framework and requirements that manufacturers, importers, and sellers must adhere to, ensuring that all products on the market are safe for consumer use.
The General Product Safety Regulation EU 2023/988 (“GPSR”) was enacted on 12 June 2023, replacing the older General Product Safety Directive (2001/95/EC) (“GPSD”). This major reform marks a crucial shift in EU product safety laws, introducing substantial changes after over 20 years.
Aimed at enhancing consumer protection and ensuring smooth market operations, the GPSR focuses on safeguarding vulnerable groups such as children and individuals with disabilities. It also strengthens the oversight and recall processes for dangerous products in the EU.
As a regulation, it will be uniformly applicable across all EU member states, including Northern Ireland (NI), minimizing discrepancies. All economic operators, including those outside the EU, must comply with the new rules. Although the GPSR became effective on 12 June 2023, its provisions will be enforceable from 13 December 2024, permitting the sale of GPSD-compliant products until that date.
What is New?
- Precautionary Principle: All stakeholders must broadly implement the precautionary principle to ensure the highest levels of product safety. This approach advocates for proactive measures to prevent harm when there is scientific uncertainty about potential risks.
- Product Safety Obligations: The GPSR establishes specific safety responsibilities for economic operators and online marketplace providers. These obligations ensure that all parties involved in the supply chain maintain high safety standards throughout a product’s lifecycle.
- Product Traceability Requirements: The regulation reinforces the need for robust traceability systems to enhance product monitoring and safety. This includes maintaining detailed records that allow for quick identification and recall of unsafe products.
- Safety Assessment Aspects: The GPSR provides a comprehensive list of factors to consider when evaluating product safety, particularly for new technologies. These factors include the product’s interaction with other products, cybersecurity measures, and the evolving capabilities of AI and other advanced technologies.
- Accident Reporting: Businesses are required to report any product-related accidents to authorities via the Safety Business Gateway promptly. This requirement ensures that significant incidents, especially those resulting in death or serious health impacts, are quickly addressed.
- Market Surveillance Rules: The regulation strengthens market surveillance rules to ensure effective enforcement of safety standards. This involves coordinated efforts among member states to monitor products and take action against non-compliant items.
- Product Recalls: The GPSR introduces detailed rules for handling product recalls, including a mandatory recall notice template. It also upholds consumer rights by ensuring they have access to remedies when a product is recalled.
General Product Safety Regulation UK
Although the United Kingdom has left the European Union (EU), certain pieces of legislation, known as ‘retained EU law,’ will continue to apply until new UK laws replace them. Still, unlike in the EU, there are no changes for UK sellers who sell with Amazon and eBay.
The regulation of product safety ensures that all consumer goods meet specific standards to protect health and prevent harm. Overall, a product is presumed safe if it complies with a designated standard approved by the Secretary of State and published by the British Standards Institution (BSI).
Navigating the Scope
The GPSR is a framework regulation that generally applies to any product made available on the EU market, regardless of whether it is new, used, repaired, or reconditioned. However, there are specific exclusions, which include:
These exclusions ensure that other specialized regulations govern specific categories of products.
8 Key Implications of the Reform
# 1: Responsible Person Role
The GPSR requires an EU-based “responsible person” to oversee product accountability. This individual must supply market authorities with proof of product compliance when needed and routinely verify the product’s adherence to technical standards. The product, packaging, parcel, or accompanying document must also include their contact details.
The Responsible Person, who must be located in the EU or NI, can be one of the following:
- The manufacturer;
- An importer;
- An authorized representative of the manufacturer;
- A fulfillment service provider if the manufacturer, importer, and authorized representative are not based in the EU or NI.
If the manufacturer isn’t in the EU or NI, you can identify the Responsible Person by:
- Contacting the manufacturer or your upstream supplier for the name and contact details of the EU or NI-based Responsible Person.
- If you’re a manufacturer or brand owner outside the EU or NI, you can appoint a subsidiary in the EU or NI or an existing EU or NI importer as the Responsible Person.
- Consulting your testing laboratory or certification company, as they may help in assigning a Responsible Person.
# 2: Online Marketplaces Updates
The EC finds that e-commerce growth has weakened the GPSD, with 73% of consumers buying online in 2021. The GPSR tackles this by regulating online marketplaces, acknowledging their critical role in ensuring product safety. Essential requirements include:
- having a contact point for market surveillance;
- ensuring traders can provide safety information to consumers;
- notifying consumers of product recalls. Marketplaces must also report dangerous products and accidents to authorities through the Safety Business Gateway.
Today, Amazon and eBay inform their sellers about those GPSR changes. By the way, if you are unsure how to sell on Amazon Europe, you can check out our blog. Also, you can discover why your products are not selling with Amazon, and how to deal with it.
# 3: Accident Reporting
The final GPSR mandates that economic operators report product-related accidents via the Safety Business Gateway without delay instead of the initial 2-business-day requirement. Though “accident” isn’t defined, it must result in death or significant health impacts to warrant reporting.
Online marketplaces have separate reporting rules, requiring reports for accidents causing severe risk or harm to consumer health. This lower threshold for online marketplaces may lead to consistency in reporting compared to economic operators.
For example, if a kitchen appliance causes an electrical fire resulting in serious burns to a user, the manufacturer or importer must promptly report this accident through the Safety Business Gateway. Similarly, if the same product sold on an online marketplace causes minor burns, the marketplace must also report this incident, ensuring consumer safety is maintained through rigorous and consistent reporting practices.
# 4: Product Recalls
One of the primary goals of the European Commission (EC) in revising the General Product Safety Directive (GPSD) has been to enhance the effectiveness of product recalls throughout the EU. The newly introduced General Product Safety Regulation (GPSR) establishes detailed requirements for conducting product recalls, which traditionally were found in guidance documents rather than formal legislation.
The GPSR mandates that manufacturers, distributors, and importers proactively initiate product recalls whenever necessary. It also stipulates that online marketplaces must collaborate fully in these recall efforts. This comprehensive approach is designed to ensure that dangerous products are swiftly removed from the market, thereby safeguarding consumer health and maintaining high safety standards across the EU.
By codifying these recall procedures into regulation, the GPSR aims to create a more consistent and efficient recall process, ensuring that all stakeholders, including online platforms, are actively involved in protecting consumers from potentially hazardous products.
The GPSR includes specific guidelines for the content and format of recall notices to ensure consistency. To refine these guidelines, the EC conducted a brief consultation on a recall notice template, as stipulated in Article 36 of the GPSR. The EC may make further adjustments to this template to accommodate various scenarios before it is finalized.
Imagine a scenario where a toy manufacturer discovers that one of its products has a defect that poses a choking hazard to children. Under the GPSR, the manufacturer must promptly initiate a product recall. This involves issuing a recall notice that includes:
# 5: New Technologies in Use
The GPSR updates EU product safety regulations to tackle 21st-century challenges, focusing on interconnected devices, software updates, and AI functionalities. It expands the definition of “product” to include interconnected items. The GPSR outlines key factors for assessing product safety:
- Impact on Other Products: Evaluating how a product affects other interconnected products.
- Cybersecurity: Ensuring products have the necessary cybersecurity features to guard against external threats.
- Advanced Functionalities: Considering the evolving, learning, and predictive capabilities of products.
Additionally, if a product undergoes substantial modification, the person making the changes will be considered the “manufacturer” responsible for that product.
Consider a smart home security system that integrates with other smart devices in a home network. Under the GPSR:
If the security system undergoes significant updates or modifications, such as adding new features or integrating new AI algorithms, the entity responsible for these changes would be deemed the “manufacturer” and thus responsible for ensuring the product remains safe and compliant with GPSR standards.
# 6: Safety Gate
The EC is reviewing a draft regulation to explain how Safety Gate will let “consumers and other interested parties” report unsafe products. The review was open until March 1, 2024.
The EC will use an automated system to filter safety concerns and send relevant information to Member States without checking the report’s authenticity. Additionally, the EC is creating rules for the Safety Gate Rapid Alert System to manage its operations.
In addition, if you want to know more about how to sell restricted products with Amazon, remember to read this blog.
# 7: Penalties
The initial GPSR drafts suggested penalties of 4% of annual turnover. The final version, however, mandates “effective, proportionate, and dissuasive” penalties, leaving the specifics to individual Member States.
Summary
The new General Product Safety Regulation EU (GPSR) introduces crucial updates for Amazon and eBay sellers in the EU and Northern Ireland. Product legislation encompasses the laws and regulations that govern the safety, labeling, and marketing of products to ensure they meet specific standards and protect consumers from harm. Keep following us and stay ahead by understanding these new requirements to ensure compliance and maintain your business’s success in the EU e-commerce market. For more helpful insights and updates, remember to check our blog.
