LVD FAQ Importers

Article 8 of Directive 2014/35/EU requires importers to place only compliant electrical equipment on the market. Member States have applied these recast importer duties since 20 April 2016. The pre-placement check is not a fresh manufacturer conformity assessment, but it must confirm that the manufacturer has completed the required conformity assessment procedure, drawn up technical documentation, affixed the CE marking, supplied the required documents, and met the manufacturer traceability and instruction duties referenced by Article 8.

The LVD Guide clarifies that the required documents for importers in Article 8(2) are the instructions and safety information. It also explains that the importer must keep a copy of the EU declaration of conformity for 10 years and ensure that technical documentation can be made available to competent national authorities on request.

The transaction determines the legal role. An importer is a person established in the Union who places electrical equipment from a third country on the Union market. A customs broker, warehouse, marketplace, or fulfilment provider is not automatically the LVD importer unless it performs that placing-on-the-market role.

The importer has its own traceability duty. It must indicate its name, registered trade name or registered trade mark, and postal contact address on the electrical equipment. Where the equipment's size or nature makes that impossible, the information may appear on the packaging or in a document accompanying the equipment.

The importer must also check that the manufacturer has complied with the LVD manufacturer identification duties. These traceability details matter because market surveillance authorities use them to identify who supplied, imported, or placed non-compliant equipment on the market.

Importer obligations continue after placement. While equipment is under the importer's responsibility, storage or transport conditions must not jeopardise conformity with the LVD safety objectives. Where risk makes it appropriate, the importer must carry out sample testing, investigate complaints, keep a register of complaints, non-conforming equipment and recalls when necessary, and keep distributors informed of monitoring.

If an importer considers or has reason to believe that equipment it placed on the market is not in conformity, it must immediately take corrective measures to bring the equipment into conformity, withdraw it, or recall it as appropriate. If the equipment presents a risk, the importer must immediately inform competent national authorities in the Member States where the equipment was made available, giving details of the non-compliance and corrective measures taken.

Directive 2014/35/EU requires importers, further to a reasoned request from a competent national authority, to provide the information and documentation necessary to demonstrate conformity in paper or electronic form and in a language easily understood by that authority. Importers must also cooperate with authorities on action taken to eliminate risks posed by equipment they placed on the market.

Regulation (EU) 2019/1020 provides the horizontal market surveillance context. Authorities may perform documentary, physical, and laboratory checks using a risk-based approach, may require economic operators to provide relevant compliance documents and supply-chain information, and may require corrective action where products present risks or do not conform to Union harmonisation legislation.

Directive 2014/35/EU treats an importer as the manufacturer where the importer places electrical equipment on the market under its own name or trade mark, or modifies equipment already placed on the market in a way that may affect conformity with the Directive. In that case, the importer takes on the manufacturer obligations rather than only the importer checks in Article 8.

This matters for private-label products, rebranded equipment, and material modifications. The importer must then be able to support the manufacturer-level conformity assessment, technical documentation, EU declaration, CE marking, production-control, instruction, traceability, corrective-action, and authority-cooperation duties.