In this week's Q5 - five questions to industry leaders - we spoke to Simon Bircham, the electrical & electronics product manager at the British Standards Institute’s product services.

How can you police the RoHS Kitemark and who is responsible for this?

As with all Kitemarks, the RoHS Trusted Kitemark follows strict operating guidelines. A key element of this is the ongoing audits of the licensee as defined in the protocol.

These regular audits ensure that the lcensee is maintaining their RoHS processes. The audits are further backed up by independent chemical analysis of randomly selected samples.

Does the value of the RoHS Kitemark depend on widespread adoption of it?

Simon Bircham

Kitemark licensees have confidence that they can demonstrate to the enforcement agency that they have the ability to comply with the Directive.

Secondly, companies may leverage significant commercial benefits by giving confidence to their customers through a compliant supply-chain and a clear marketing advantage.

Clearly as the number of RoHS Trusted Kitemark companies continues to grow the benefits and value of the Kitemark are spread through out the entire supply chain.

A producer being supplied by a RoHS Trusted Kitemark company can have the confidence that the supplier’s RoHS claims are backed up by the Kitemark, which in turn helps manage the risk to the end producer.

How much does it cost firms to get a RoHS Kitemark?

The overall cost may vary from company to company depending on the size of the company and the scope of the license. However, the first step towards gaining the Kitemark, called ‘PARTS’ costs £1,600 in the UK.

This first step provides the client with RoHS assessment and gap-analysis, the essential building blocks to help start their action plan to becoming RoHS Compliant.

Overall, the cost of the Kitemark licence pails into insignificance compared to the risk not being able to provide evidence to the enforcement agency and having product removed from the market.

Why should firms bother with the RoHS Kitemark?

Simply put, the process of gaining the RoHS Trusted Kitemark means that RoHS Trusted Kitemark licensees have the ability to provide supporting evidence to back up their RoHS declarations should they be challenged by enforcement bodies.

Is the European attitude to standards more consensual than the US approach?

Standards form an integral part of the industry these days regardless of whether the standard is British, European, North American or even military. It is not really a question of the degree of consensus but more about what is appropriate.

BSI Global