UKCA & UKNI Marking

UKCA & UKNI Marking

The UKCA Mark stands for “UK Con­for­mi­ty Assessed,” and the UKNI Mark stands for the “UK and North­ern Ire­land” mark­ing. Since the UK left the EU on 2020-12-31, changes in how prod­ucts are marked have been in flux. For the fore­see­able future, machine builders can use the CE Mark or the new UKCA Mark­ing (UKNI for prod­ucts man­u­fac­tured in the UK and placed on the North­ern Ire­land mar­ket.) The UKCA Mark­ing applies in Wales, Eng­land and Scotland.

The UKCA mark­ing applies to most goods pre­vi­ous­ly sub­ject to the CE mark­ing. It also applies to aerosol prod­ucts that pre­vi­ous­ly required the ‘reverse epsilon’ mark­ing. The CE Mark­ing and the reversed epsilon mark­ing con­tin­ue to be rec­og­nized; see below.

Effective date

The UKCA mark­ing reg­u­la­tion comes into effect on 2024-10-01. How­ev­er, you can still use the CE mark­ing for the fore­see­able future. How­ev­er, the UK refers to the Machin­ery Direc­tive (2006/42/EC) as that doc­u­ment was trans­posed into UK law as the Sup­ply of Machin­ery (Safe­ty) Reg­u­la­tions 2008. Since the EU is mov­ing to the new Machin­ery Reg­u­la­tion, there is a lack of clar­i­ty regard­ing the UK’s adop­tion of the new reg­u­la­tion in time for the manda­to­ry imple­men­ta­tion date in Jan­u­ary 2027. That may be the point where the first break with EU law occurs.

In some cas­es, you must apply the new UKCA mark­ing to goods sold in Great Britain imme­di­ate­ly from 2021-01-01.

Validity

The CE mark­ing will remain valid in Great Britain in the fore­see­able future. Either the UKCA or the CE Mark can be used. The UK Gov­ern­ment has issued a guid­ance doc­u­ment [1] that includes infor­ma­tion on the con­tin­ued recog­ni­tion of EU Marks.

Continued recognition of EU requirements

1. The UK Gov­ern­ment will indef­i­nite­ly rec­og­nize cur­rent EU require­ments, includ­ing the CE mark­ing and reversed epsilon mark­ing for 21 prod­uct reg­u­la­tions. The reg­u­la­tions in scope are list­ed in [1, Annex A].
2. Busi­ness­es can also con­tin­ue to use the UKCA mark­ing to place rel­e­vant prod­ucts on the GB mar­ket. Com­pa­nies can use the CE or the UKCA mark­ing to place rel­e­vant prod­ucts on the GB market.

What do I need to do to make use of continued recognition?

3. If a busi­ness uses the rec­og­nized EU require­ments to place a prod­uct on the GB mar­ket, it must ensure they have under­tak­en all the nec­es­sary con­for­mi­ty process­es. This includes using an EU Noti­fied Body where required and apply­ing the rel­e­vant EU con­for­mi­ty mark­ing (CE or reversed epsilon) to the product.
4. Addi­tion­al­ly, the busi­ness must pro­vide a Dec­la­ra­tion of Con­for­mi­ty that has been trans­lat­ed into Eng­lish and lists all the rel­e­vant EU prod­uct direc­tives and reg­u­la­tions that have been met.
5. If you place a prod­uct on the GB mar­ket from out­side the UK, you will still need to take action to ensure you com­ply with importer responsibilities.

Conformity Assessment Bodies

If a CE Marked prod­uct requires an EU Noti­fied Body for mark­ing, a UK Autho­rized Body will be required for the same pur­pose. Many of the EU Noti­fied Bod­ies are also UK Autho­rized Bod­ies so all that may be required is to pur­chase an addi­tion­al ser­vice from the same organization.

The UK Mar­ket Con­for­mi­ty Assess­ment Bod­ies (UKMCAB) data­base lists all bod­ies which can pro­vide con­for­mi­ty assess­ments for the UK market.

Authorized Representatives

Com­pa­nies out­side the UK that mar­ket a prod­uct in the UK and pre­vi­ous­ly used an EU-based orga­ni­za­tion to act as an Autho­rized rep­re­sen­ta­tive will need a UK-based rep­re­sen­ta­tive. Many of the EU-based com­pa­nies offer­ing Autho­rized Rep­re­sen­ta­tive ser­vices also have offices in the UK and can, there­fore, act in both the EU and the UK, so all that may be required is to pur­chase an addi­tion­al ser­vice from the same organization.

Technical requirements

You must meet the tech­ni­cal require­ments (“essen­tial require­ments”), and the con­for­mi­ty assess­ment process­es and stan­dards used to demon­strate con­for­mi­ty are essen­tial­ly the same as they were for the CE marking.

The cir­cum­stances in which you can use self-dec­la­ra­tion of con­for­mi­ty for UKCA mark­ing are the same as for CE mark­ing. Check the list of areas where self-dec­la­ra­tion is per­mit­ted.

UK Regulations

Euro­pean Union	Unit­ed Kingdom
Elec­tro­mag­net­ic Com­pat­i­bil­i­ty — Direc­tive 2014/30/EU	Elec­tro­mag­net­ic Com­pat­i­bil­i­ty Reg­u­la­tions 2016
Low Volt­age Direc­tive 2014/35	Elec­tri­cal Equip­ment (Safe­ty) Reg­u­la­tions 2016
Safe­ty of Machin­ery 2006/42/EC	Sup­ply of Machin­ery (Safe­ty) Reg­u­la­tions 2008
Machin­ery Reg­u­la­tion 2023/1230	Unknown

Applicability

The UKCA Mark can­not be used for prod­ucts for sale in North­ern Ire­land. This is because the UK signed the North­ern Ire­land Pro­to­col with the EU so that North­ern Ire­land can con­tin­ue to be aligned with the EU fol­low­ing the Good Fri­day Agree­ment and the UK.

Northern Ireland

The North­ern Ire­land Pro­to­col came into force on 2021-01-01. As long as it is in force, North­ern Ire­land will align with rel­e­vant EU rules relat­ing to plac­ing man­u­fac­tured goods on the market.

Placing goods on the market in Northern Ireland

If you mar­ket cer­tain goods, you must use the UKNI con­for­mi­ty mark­ing to show that they meet the rel­e­vant rules.

In North­ern Ire­land, EU con­for­mi­ty mark­ings show that goods meet EU rules. This is the CE mark­ing for most man­u­fac­tured goods, but there are oth­er mark­ings for spe­cif­ic products.

If you use a UK body to car­ry out manda­to­ry third-par­ty con­for­mi­ty assess­ment, you must also apply a UKNI marking.

You nev­er apply the UKNI mark­ing alone — it must be accom­pa­nied by an EU con­for­mi­ty marking.

Northern Ireland Regulations

Machin­ery is a new-approach prod­uct cov­ered by at least the fol­low­ing leg­is­la­tion. Addi­tion­al Directives/Regulations may apply.

Euro­pean Union	North­ern Ireland
Elec­tro­mag­net­ic Com­pat­i­bil­i­ty — Direc­tive 2014/30/EU	Elec­tro­mag­net­ic Com­pat­i­bil­i­ty Reg­u­la­tions 2016
Low Volt­age Direc­tive 2014/35	Elec­tri­cal Equip­ment (Safe­ty) Reg­u­la­tions 2016
Safe­ty of Machin­ery 2006/42/EC	Sup­ply of Machin­ery (Safe­ty) Reg­u­la­tions 2008
EU Machin­ery Reg­u­la­tion 2023/1230	Unknown

Using the UKNI Mark

You need to use the UKNI mark­ing if all of the fol­low­ing apply:

• you are plac­ing cer­tain goods (most­ly those goods sub­ject to the CE mark­ing) on the North­ern Ire­land market
• your goods require manda­to­ry third-par­ty con­for­mi­ty assessment
• you are plan­ning to use a UK body to car­ry out those con­for­mi­ty assessments

You will not be able to use the UKNI mark­ing if either of the fol­low­ing applies:

• you are plac­ing goods on the mar­ket in the EU
• you are plan­ning to use an EU body to car­ry out con­for­mi­ty assessments

Man­u­fac­tur­ers based in North­ern Ire­land (or the man­u­fac­tur­er’s autho­rized rep­re­sen­ta­tive) who cur­rent­ly mark goods based on a sup­pli­er’s dec­la­ra­tion of con­for­mi­ty do not need to make any changes. Using the rel­e­vant con­for­mi­ty mark­ings, your goods remain valid on the UK and EU markets.

How to use the UKNI marking

Placing the UKNI marking

In most cas­es, you must apply the UKNI mark­ing to the prod­uct or pack­ag­ing. Some­times, it may be placed in man­u­als or oth­er sup­port­ing doc­u­ments. This will vary depend­ing on the spe­cif­ic reg­u­la­tions that apply to the product.

The fol­low­ing gen­er­al rules apply:

• the UKNI mark­ing must only be placed on a prod­uct by you as the man­u­fac­tur­er or your autho­rized rep­re­sen­ta­tive (where allowed for in the rel­e­vant legislation)
• when attach­ing the UKNI mark­ing to accom­pa­ny anoth­er con­for­mi­ty mark­ing, you take full respon­si­bil­i­ty for your pro­duc­t’s con­for­mi­ty with the require­ments of the rel­e­vant legislation
• you must not place any mark­ing or sign that may mis­con­strue the mean­ing or form of the UKNI mark­ing to third parties
• you must not attach oth­er mark­ings on the prod­uct which affect the vis­i­bil­i­ty, leg­i­bil­i­ty or mean­ing of the UKNI marking
• the UKNI mark­ing can­not be placed on prod­ucts unless there is a spe­cif­ic require­ment to do so in the legislation
• the UKNI mark­ing must accom­pa­ny anoth­er con­for­mi­ty mark­ing; it nev­er appears on a prod­uct alone

Rules for using the UKNI marking

You must make sure that:

• if you reduce or enlarge the size of your mark­ing, the let­ters form­ing the UKNI mark­ing must be in pro­por­tion to the ver­sion set out below
• the UKNI mark­ing is at least 5mm in height – unless a dif­fer­ent min­i­mum dimen­sion is spec­i­fied in the rel­e­vant legislation
• the UKNI mark­ing is eas­i­ly vis­i­ble, leg­i­ble, and per­ma­nent­ly attached

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References

[1] Depart­ment for Busi­ness and Trade, ‘Pol­i­cy Update: Plac­ing prod­ucts on the mar­ket in Great Britain using UK or EU prod­uct mark­ings’. Gov­ern­ment of the Unit­ed King­dom and North­ern Ire­land, Jan. 2024. Avail­able: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/65b7b54b522b5100138609e1/industry-explainer-placing-products-on-the-market-in-great-britain-using-uk-or-eu-product-markings.pdf. [Accessed: Oct. 03, 2024]

[2] ‘Using the UKCA mark­ing’, GOV.UK, May 17, 2024. Avail­able: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/using-the-ukca-marking. [Accessed: Oct. 03, 2024]

[3] The Prod­uct Safe­ty and Metrol­o­gy etc. (Amend­ment) Reg­u­la­tions 2024’, May 23, 2024. Avail­able: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2024/696/contents/made. [Accessed: Oct. 03, 2024]

Updat­ed 2024-10-03