EU GPSR: Exxos, do you have an EU point of contact?

[Steve]

You could even be sneaky and put some crazy disclaimer in the shop that customers have to tick and agree to. Something like: "My products are NOT intended for sale in the EU. If you are someone purchasing this product with an address in the EU, you are agreeing that this item is not to be used within the EU and is only being delivered to you for reasons other than using the product within the EU" something like that haha 😂 there MUST be reasons that someone needs to temporarily store, or send to another place, rather than directly use.

[rubber_jonnie]

If I move to France when I retire I'll be your representative in the EU :)

I'll expect to either be paid a nominal fee or get free stuff :sarcasm:

[sporniket]

Most likely, customs will sample incoming parcels, then for non-conforming parcels, either there is a contact info to the buyer that will have to provide required infos as usual, otherwise the parcel being returned to sender ?

[Steve]

Most likely, customs will sample incoming parcels, then for non-conforming parcels, either there is a contact info to the buyer that will have to provide required infos as usual, otherwise the parcel being returned to sender ?

I can't imagine them sampling all parcels from all countries. I imagine they will focus Chinese stuff.

[exxos]

If I move to France when I retire I'll be your representative in the EU :)

I'll expect to either be paid a nominal fee or get free stuff :sarcasm:

Yeah but even that wouldn't be enough ... :( Your supposed to have all documents to deal with any safety concerns etc... like someone could ask you for risk assessment documents or safety reports, or ask for supply chain details. You would need a heap of documents for everything I sell... It's just not viable.

I've been seeing all sorts of quotes people got when looking into it. Like hundreds of pounds per year to thousands per month or per product.. you can't just pay it and call it job done :( For little sellers like me, its a hard brick wall.

The EU just want to destroy the little people by the looks of it to me. A few people remain hopeful the EU will refine the rules.. but how long that will take.. if it ever happens... It be to late anyway. Damage will start commencing next week.. I just hope the UK doesn't start doing crazy crap like all this next....

[exxos]

Most likely, customs will sample incoming parcels, then for non-conforming parcels, either there is a contact info to the buyer that will have to provide required infos as usual, otherwise the parcel being returned to sender ?

I can't imagine them sampling all parcels from all countries. I imagine they will focus Chinese stuff.

That's what I mentioned earlier. How they even going to enforce it ? People who want to keep selling just have to hope they don't get found out.. otherwise they could get big fines from what I've read. I'm just keeping out of it all.

Was bad enough with all that CN22 stuff a few months ago. It's created more work for us dealing with that. Now we have to print out bar codes, fill in online forms... I mean we only just got though all that crap and now it's onto the next thing... It never ends... I'm just sick of dealing with it all.

[exxos]

Also stumbled across The German Packaging Act... Sellers supposed to register packaging or something... WTF is all that about. I guess I shouldn't be selling to Germany anyway.. The whole thing is just insane. No way can I keep up with all this crap.

[exxos]

Reply from PCB company in China..

Hi Chris，

Thank you very much for your inquiry. May I ask if you are selling your boards on Amazon? I have checked the article and have a general understanding of that new regulation. It seems to affect Amazon sellers the most.

These new regulations do create complications for many companies, and we very much understand the impact they may have on your sales and the open source community as a whole. At the moment we are able to sell our boards normally to Northern Europe, mainly the Netherlands, France and other countries (normal declaration).

While the situation is still somewhat unclear, we will actively review how best to comply with the new requirements in order to continue to serve our European customers.

Have you tried to improve some fundamental information in accordance with the regulations?
Best Regards,

So I don't think they even knew about and and don't understand it either.

I watched a lot of videos last night on it all. Even people who have had face to face meetings with ebay reps. Odd thing so far, is ebay private sellers don't need to comply (which makes no sense). Someone else reported private sellers are being forced over to business sellers. One said the "EU overseas responsible person" is optional, which makes no sense. I don't think ebay even understand what's going on.

Overall, there has been a HUGE number of sellers who have already stopped selling to EU. A lot are simply giving up as the information they want is stupid, the costs of a EU rep is insane. Its totally impossible for people to trade in the EU under the current law.

I still have not seen any chatter on what people INSIDE the EU are doing. They only difference they seem to have , is they can represent themselves. But it still basically wipes out a lot of the small sellers market due to all the work involved anyway. It seems to be nobody in the EU seems to know this is even happening yet. Mostly its been the focus on the UK side of it all. There's no chatter from USA people (from what I have seen so far) about how they are going to send stuff to EU either. I can only assume, people are simply unaware of it all.

Ebay people saying it takes long enough to fill information out on ebay listings as it is. They not going to spend all day looking for more information to sell the odd one-off item. Problem being for old items there is no manufactures contacts as they don't exist anymore. Currently people saying they tried putting in "zeros" into the information boxes and ebay accepted the info, but god knows how that's going to end, likely not well.

From what I understand, ebay will hide listings within the EU which does not have the proper information. So I would imagine a lot of sellers are not even aware that their sales could possibly crash in about a weeks time. Peoples EU sales could drop significantly for UK sellers for example, if the sellers are unaware of what is going on there will be left slightly confused as to why their sales have significantly dropped for no apparent reason.

Also a lot of platforms will ban you if you do not comply with the new regulations.. So I think is going to be a lot of angry people very soon.. While there is normally a bit of a boom towards Christmas for a lot of sellers, things generally go quiet after Christmas anyway. So I think people just assume it seems unusually quieter than previous years not really understand why it has happened. It could take some people at least two months to figure out something is even wrong!

In 2023, the United Kingdom exported approximately £356 billion worth of goods and services to the European Union, accounting for 42% of all UK exports. Imports from the EU during the same period amounted to about £466 billion, representing 52% of the UK's total imports.

These figures highlight the significant role the EU plays in the UK's trade landscape, with a substantial portion of both exports and imports linked to EU member states.

UK's Export Composition:

Small Businesses: According to the UK's Federation of Small Businesses (FSB), small and medium enterprises (SMEs) account for about 30% of all UK exports. While not all of this is to the EU, a substantial portion is likely tied to EU markets due to their proximity and economic ties.

Large Firms: The remaining 70% of exports are dominated by large corporations.

It is unclear how much of that is down to small sellers but is probably some the insignificant amount which the European Union seem happy to write off as collateral damage. It also begs the question of what the UK government is doing about all this.. Likely nothing.. But this affects everyone in the world not just the UK.. Something seriously does not add up with all this...... Nobody should have the power to write off the entire small business market like this! But in this day and age, I am really not surprised about anything anymore.

There has been a small number of people who said they are just going to battle it out. But there was talks of fines up to £20,000 and up to 15 years imprisonment depending on the offence. A lot of people read this is as extremely threatening behaviour and of course simply don't want to get involved with the risks. Seems to be a rising trend of companies basically threatening people and getting away with it all the time. We all might as well be in martial law at this point.. Always "do as we say or else" . Those who think I'm talking crap, for starters just go look at the videos of what threatening letters the BBC send out people continuously over the TV licencing. I personally have had many threatening letters from companies over the years. But that that's all another problem anyway...

Again there is nothing of what people inside the EU are going to do about all the additional paperwork and time involved with all this. The only saving grace to me personally is that thank God we are not in the EU, as even without the representative problem I just could not deal with all the additional administration work. I would be shutting down my store permanently on Monday and it would literally be game over. I just hope to God that the UK doesn't start implementing the same laws as we could all be going through all this again.

Some people remain hopeful that the EU recognise the damage what they are doing will correct it later on. But the problem is, the damage is already in motion and already causing people to shut down. The bulk of sellers sapping shutting down over the past month already. So for a lot of people it's kind of irrelevant if they fix this problem in weeks months or years down the line. Its going to be simply too late. One person suggested finding out what person created this law and putting their address in as the responsible person. Sounds like a good thing to do to me!!

TL;DR
The whole thing is just simply ludicrous and companies really need to start treating citizens and small sellers better. The amount of stress this has caused me alone and a huge volume of sellers on eBay and other platforms have seriously caused a lot of distress for a lot of people. People already suffering and there only trying to make a living doing what they can and they just see it like me, the "powers that be" just continuously pull the rug out from under them. I mean these people are willing to work in trying to "go it alone" , should really be supported not penalised for their efforts!

:mad: :mad: :mad:

[rubber_jonnie]

If I move to France when I retire I'll be your representative in the EU :)

I'll expect to either be paid a nominal fee or get free stuff :sarcasm:

Yeah but even that wouldn't be enough ... :( Your supposed to have all documents to deal with any safety concerns etc... like someone could ask you for risk assessment documents or safety reports, or ask for supply chain details. You would need a heap of documents for everything I sell... It's just not viable.

I've been seeing all sorts of quotes people got when looking into it. Like hundreds of pounds per year to thousands per month or per product.. you can't just pay it and call it job done :( For little sellers like me, its a hard brick wall.

The EU just want to destroy the little people by the looks of it to me. A few people remain hopeful the EU will refine the rules.. but how long that will take.. if it ever happens... It be to late anyway. Damage will start commencing next week.. I just hope the UK doesn't start doing crazy crap like all this next....

I was saying that half in jest, but we still might emigrate, despite all the political shenanigans going on in France at the moment. Can't be any worse than here and TBH the people a a lot nicer!

TBH I expect there will be get out clauses for low volume suppliers, it seems madness to basically block people who sell small amounts because they want larger suppliers to do what they say.

[exxos]

I was saying that half in jest,

Yes I understood that :)

but we still might emigrate, despite all the political shenanigans going on in France at the moment. Can't be any worse than here and TBH the people a a lot nicer!

I would move somewhere else if I thought anywhere was any better.

My aunt and uncle moved to France and was over there for about five years and they came back to England, they basically said the opposite and said the people were not nice at all and really did not like the English people. I guess it really depends on the area..

TBH I expect there will be get out clauses for low volume suppliers, it seems madness to basically block people who sell small amounts because they want larger suppliers to do what they say.

That's the only hope currently. The thing is they have basically caused all the damage already now. But any exceptions, unless it's done literally next week and is perfectly clear on what's what, it's not really going to help the majority of people anyway. If people only sell a couple of items to EU per year and simply stop selling now, even if the law was changed I think they may just decide not to bother again anyway. Just not worth the hassle or risk of something going wrong again in the future etc

My calculation is that 33% of my sales go to the EU. I've always suspected something would happen where I could not ship to the EU even talked about it previously. I can survive yes, but that is a significant impact on my sales revenue per year.. Less money coming in also equates to less funds for putting projects into production and developing new products etc I have been struggling enough as it is, which is why I started taking donations to at least have the money to keep the entire exxoshost ever running even if I am forced to shut down my store totally. Certainly not a good time to small businesses right now... And all happening right at Christmas time as well when people should be at their busiest...

I have patched my store code so I can easily turn off a non-EU sales. But I myself have just been put off wanting to deal with the EU now period. Like I said earlier, I was not even aware of the German packaging law licensing crap. God knows what all the laws are out there which I am unaware of. So even if something is sorted out, I think I would be reluctant to enable EU sales again in the future anyway. It just does not seem like it's worth potential hassle.