Such a short timeframe to change energy efficiency labelling is impossible to comply with for SMEs

Brussels, 29th September 2016 - In a joint letter to the Slovak Presidency of the Council, regarding the revision of the Energy Efficiency Labelling Regulation, UEAPME, EuroCommerce and Independent Retail Europe spoke up against the Ministers for Energy’s decision to shorten of the timeframe for label replacement. In this context, UEAPME states that there is absolutely no reasonable argument behind this reduction. Not only can small and medium sized retailers not comply with a much shorter period of time than the one initially requested by UEAPME (which was six months). But, this is yet another administrative burden for suppliers and dealers that SMEs have to deal with. The 3-week timeframe is already problematic for dealers with a broad product range or with few employees as they need sufficient time to replace labels. Further reducing is irresponsible and would only make matters worse for retailers all over Europe.

Although UEAPME supports the EU energy efficiency label as a useful tool to inform consumers about the energy efficiency of products, the association is very much concerned about the regulation’s effective and workable implementation, namely the time period for dealers to replace existing labels with rescaled labels. Indeed, the obligation to add a new label to a rescaled product creates a disproportionate administrative burden for suppliers and dealers, in particular for retailer SMEs.

UEAPME has always argued for a time period giving retailers sufficient time to adapt their internal processes to comply with the already burdensome relabelling obligation. Any time lapse shorter than the 3 weeks’ period the plenary of the European Parliament agreed upon would be impossible for businesses. Dealers with a broad product range or with few employees need sufficient time to replace labels.