On December 5, 2012, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) issued the final rule¹ regarding representative sample selection for the periodic testing of children’s products, which was the final piece of the Testing and Labeling rule (16 CFR 1107). This rule, along with other requirements of 16 CFR 1107, will apply to children’s products manufactured after February 8, 2013.

This rule¹ requires the manufacturer of children’s product to select representative samples, sent to third party labs for testing, using a procedure that provides a basis for inferring compliance about the population of untested products produced during the applicable periodic testing interval. Furthermore, the rule requires that the manufacturer document the procedure(s) used to select the samples for periodic testing and note the basis for their belief that the samples are representative of the untested products produced during the periodic testing interval. These documents will be part of the recordkeeping requirements of the Testing and Labeling rule (16 CFR 1107) and must be maintained for 5 years.

1. http://www.cpsc.gov/businfo/frnotices/fr13/repsample.pdf

The Challenge
Manufacturers will have to determine appropriate methods for selecting representative samples, rationalize why these samples provide continued compliance of all the samples (tested and untested) and finally document this information and keep the records for 5 years.

The Solution
Intertek, through our extensive global network, has a variety of services available to help you overcome the challenges related to complying with the various children’s products requirements of Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act of 2008 (CPSIA). Besides keeping you ｕｐｄａｔｅd on these and other new CPSC product safety developments, Intertek experts can assess your specific compliance and product testing needs and recommend ways to ensure that your children’s and other product testing programs meet all the CPSC (and other U.S. and international) requirements, in the most effective and efficient way possible.

In addition, Intertek developed iComply^TM, a user-friendly, web-based artificial intelligence application facilitating collaborative supply chain assembly of technical files. Please click here to learn how iComply^TM assists finished product manufacturers comply with requirements like this and many more.