News

Budget Pack Powers B2B Compliance (18/08/2009)

WEEE compliance scheme, B2B Compliance has joined forces with Budget Pack, one of the UK’s leading total compliance solution providers, to deliver battery compliance to its 470 members under the Batteries Regulations which came into force on May 5th 2009.  

Tight deadlines mean that producers have little time to understand the compliance schemes available before having to commit to one by October 15th. To support its members, B2B Compliance undertook a review of the eight schemes applying for approval under the regulations, choosing Budget Pack as the scheme it believes will offer the best value for its members.

This move shows how the battery compliance market is consolidating as compliance schemes, which will not cover battery compliance, ally themselves with those who have submitted applications for approval.

B2B Compliance Project director, David Burton, explained: “Having made the decision not to offer battery compliance ourselves, we felt it was important to provide support to our members that have obligations under the new legislation. By assessing the levels of service, knowledge, market positioning and ethos of each organisation we decided that Budget Pack would provide a best value approach of personal service, efficiency and competitiveness.”

Managing director of Budget Pack, Steve Clark, welcomed the endorsement of B2B Compliance. He said: “We’re delighted to be aligned with B2B Compliance to meet the needs of their members in terms of portable battery obligations. We both have a similar focus in providing best value for members, as B2B Compliance has been doing for its members in the WEEE marketplace.”

He added: “we are committed to providing the optimum solution to match the requirements of each individual company we take on.  So far we have been well supported by producers and we urge any obligated company that has not yet identified its preferred batteries compliance scheme to get in touch.”

B2B Compliance has about 20 members obligated under batteries – out of its total membership of over 470 EEE producers.

The Batteries Regulations has been introduced to reduce the 600 million portable batteries that currently end up in UK landfill sites each year. The ambitious, yet achievable targets require that 25 per cent of these batteries are recycled by 2012, rising to 45 per cent by 2016.
Schemes are required to match their members’ aggregated obligations to recycle waste portable batteries by putting in place an appropriate collection infrastructure.  The Environment Agency is reviewing operational plans to ensure that only schemes with appropriate operational plans are approved. 

To find out more about Budget Pack’s battery compliance scheme, join Budget Pack's free info scheme here.

Notes to editors:
• Budget Pack is one of the fastest-growing compliance schemes which covers packaging, WEEE and batteries and was established in 2003.
• Budget Pack is a £1.6 million business that has more than 420 clients across its WEEE, packaging and battery compliance portfolio.
• Producers are defined as companies that put batteries, or equipment containing batteries, on the market for the first time in the UK. 
• From January 1st 2010, producers that place more than 1tonne of batteries on the market will be obligated to finance the recycling of 10% of those batteries, a target that their scheme will meet on their behalf.
• Companies that provide batteries on a professional basis to an end user will be known as distributors and will have obligations to take back waste portable batteries in stores that sell more than 32kg of batteries per year. 
• Distributor obligations start from 1st February 2010.