PPWR: deadlines, inspections and what happens on breach

Since 12 August 2026. From that day, packaging may no longer be newly placed on the EU market without a valid EU Declaration of Conformity under Art. 39 PPWR. There is no transitional period for this obligation.

Two dates are often confused: Regulation (EU) 2025/40 entered into force on 11 February 2025. It became applicable – that is, binding on companies – on 12 August 2026.

Important in practice: not all PPWR requirements apply from that date. From August 2026 the focus is mainly on Art. 5 (substance restrictions, heavy metals, PFAS). Recyclability grades and minimum recycled content follow only in 2030, harmonised labelling in 2028.

This means your declaration today only needs to confirm the requirements that actually apply at the time of placing on the market – not those coming years from now.

First: this can be put right, and you are not alone. Draw up the declaration now and record the issue date honestly. Backdating would not be a solution but an additional risk.

The main risk here is not primarily a fine but market access. Under Art. 62 PPWR, a missing or incorrect declaration of conformity counts as formal non-conformity. The authority will first ask you to correct it within a reasonable period.

If the non-conformity persists, Member States are obliged to take appropriate measures – up to prohibiting the making available of the packaging on the market, or requiring its withdrawal or recall.

In practice: anyone who acts now and prepares the documents promptly is in a far better position during an inspection than someone who leaves it. Start with the packaging you use in the largest volumes.

Market surveillance – checking whether packaging on the market actually meets PPWR requirements – falls to the competent authorities of the federal states (Länder) in Germany. There is no single central federal authority for this.

The Central Agency Packaging Register (ZSVR) is responsible for LUCID registration, not for market surveillance of the declaration of conformity. It does, however, refer suspected cases to the state-level authorities.

Candidly: enforcement practice in Germany is still developing – which state authority is responsible in a given case, and how intensively checks are carried out, is not yet uniformly settled everywhere.

Also relevant: customs can play a role on import. Where there is substantial doubt about conformity or documents are missing at import, customs and market surveillance authorities work together.

Generally ten days. On a reasoned request from a competent national authority, you must provide the required information and documents within that period.

That sounds comfortable at first – in practice it often is not. Ten days means being able to locate and produce the right declaration of conformity, the associated technical documentation and, where applicable, test reports for one specific packaging version.

In larger companies such a request is typically passed around internally before anyone actually starts searching. The real working time shrinks quickly to a few days.

A practical self-test: pick ten of your items at random and try to assemble the complete documentation for each. Whatever is missing there will also be missing during a real authority request.

It is quite possible. Under Art. 39(5) PPWR, competent authorities shall endeavour to verify the accuracy of at least a proportion of declarations of conformity each year – on a risk-based approach, not purely at random.

Risk-based means in practice: conspicuous sectors, goods imported from third countries, complaints from competitors or consumers, and products with particular substance risks are more likely to be checked than unremarkable standard packaging.

For many smaller sellers, though, the more likely check is not an official one at all: marketplaces, major customers and business partners now request the declaration of their own accord to meet their own obligations.

That means: even if an authority never comes knocking, a missing document can cost you a customer. For that case it should be ready to hand – not merely findable within ten days.

Be cautious with specific figures here. The PPWR itself sets no fixed fine amounts – it merely obliges Member States to lay down effective sanctions. In Germany the Packaging Implementation Act (VerpackDG) provides that framework.

The figures currently circulating in guides and blog posts vary widely – from a few thousand to six-figure sums. Some are carried over from other legislation. We therefore deliberately do not quote a specific number.

What does follow clearly from the regulation is the consequence that actually matters: under Art. 62 PPWR, making a non-conforming packaging available on the market can be prohibited, up to withdrawal or recall.

For an online seller that is usually the greater commercial risk compared with the fine itself: a sales ban on your main packaging hits the business immediately.

Act immediately. If you find that a packaging already placed on the market does not meet the requirements, you are obliged to take corrective measures without delay and to inform the competent market surveillance authority.

This is counterintuitive but important: the notification duty applies even if the authority would never have noticed on its own. Those who actively correct and report a breach regularly fare better than those where it is discovered later.

Corrective measures vary by case: adjusting the packaging, repeating the conformity assessment with an updated declaration, or in serious cases withdrawing the affected goods from the market.

Document the entire process – when you noticed the problem, what you did, and when you informed the authority. That documentation belongs in your technical documentation.

No, neither. The PPWR Declaration of Conformity does not have to be published in your online shop, made publicly accessible, or physically included with the packaging. It is primarily addressed to market surveillance authorities.

That sets it clearly apart from consumer information such as withdrawal instructions or product labelling, which genuinely must be visible.

Something different applies to the marking of the packaging itself: under Art. 15(5) PPWR every packaging must carry a type, batch or serial number for identification, and under Art. 15(6) additionally the name and postal address of the manufacturer. These details may be printed or provided via a QR code.

In short: the document stays with you, but the packaging itself needs a mark that allows the matching declaration to be identified.

They can ask – though downstream business partners generally have no statutory right to it. The legal obligation to produce the document is owed to market surveillance authorities, not to customers.

In practice the question is very real nonetheless: marketplaces and business customers increasingly request the declaration because they want to meet their own due diligence duties. Distributors must verify under the PPWR that the required documents exist.

Commercially this carries weight: if a major customer or a marketplace wants to see the document and you cannot supply it, you may lose the customer long before any authority takes notice.

Our advice: treat such requests not as a nuisance but as a selling point. Anyone who supplies the declaration within hours looks more professional than a competitor who searches for weeks.

Start with an inventory: which different packaging types do you actually use? Usually there are fewer than people think – often three to five recurring formats, not hundreds.

Second step: clarify your role. If you place packaging on the market under your own name, you are the manufacturer and therefore responsible for the declaration. If you import goods from a non-EU country, importer obligations apply to you as well.

Third step: request the data from your packaging suppliers – material type with recycling code, weight per component, confirmation on heavy metals and PFAS. Under Art. 16 PPWR suppliers are obliged to provide this. Experience shows this is the most time-consuming part.

Only then comes the filling-in itself, and that takes only minutes. Prioritise by volume: start with the packaging that most of your shipments go out in.