Published on: 07 July 2022
The UK government has announced a relaxation of the new requirements for UK Conformity Assessed (UKCA) marking that was due to come into force on the 1 January 2023.
BEIS has announced that it is introducing the following additional measures to support businesses in adopting the UKCA marking requirements:
- It will reduce re-testing costs for UKCA certification, by allowing conformity assessment activities for CE marking completed by 31 December 2022 to be used by manufacturers as the basis for UKCA marking. This will reduce the immediate costs faced by manufacturers and will be valid until the expiry of their certificate or for 5 years (31 December 2027), whichever is sooner. This will reduce duplication and costs for businesses and by extension, consumers.
- It will make it clear that there is no need to re-test existing imported stock, as these products will be considered already placed on the market In Great Britain (GB). This will prevent the costly, and unnecessary re-labelling of existing stock for businesses.
- It will make it clear that spare parts that repair, replace or maintain goods already on the GB market can meet the same requirements that were in place at the time the original product or system was placed on the GB market. This will allow products and goods requiring spare parts to continue to be maintained.
- It will continue to allow businesses to affix the UKCA marking and to include importer information for products from EEA countries (and in some cases Switzerland), on an accompanying document or label until 31 December 2025. This will allow businesses to adjust their product design to accommodate marking changes at a convenient and cost-effective time.
Note that businesses still need to be ready to start using UKCA marking before 1 January 2023.
It has also updated the guidance on GOV.UK: Using the UKCA marking and Placing manufactured goods on the market in GB.
We urge all members who manufacture, import and distribute to read the guidance documents to fully understand these changing requirements.
