One of the requirements of the EU Cosmetics Regulation (EC) No. 1223/2009 is that every cosmetic product placed on the EU market has a designated Responsible Person (RP). That RP is legally responsible for the regulatory compliance of the cosmetic products on the EU market.
Post Market Surveillance is a crucial aspect of the Cosmetic Regulation and comes under the RP’s remit.
Extracts from the EU Cosmetics Regulation as follows:-
Effective market surveillance is necessary in order to ensure that the provisions of this Regulation are respected. To this end, serious undesirable effects should be notified and competent authorities should have a possibility to request from the Responsible Person a list of cosmetic products containing substances which have raised serious doubts in terms of safety. – EU Cosmetics Regulation (EC) No.1223/2009.
Responsible Persons who consider or have reason to believe that a cosmetic product which they have placed on the market is not in conformity with this Regulation shall immediately take the corrective measures necessary to bring that product into conformity, withdraw it or recall it, as appropriate. – EU Cosmetics Regulation (EC) No.1223/2009. Article 5.2
On Friday 22nd January 2016, two members of the MSL team went into a well-known retailer to perform surveillance on some of the products we act as RP for. This was the first time the store had ever been approached by an RP looking to check their products. We gave the Store Manager an insight into what we do as a company and explained the purpose of the visit and its mutual benefits.
What we observed from our products is in general they were compliant. We did observe that some of the brands which have recently mandated us as their RP still had the previous RP on some of the packaging, although the new stock is now starting to filter through. This is acceptable under the Regulation.
Once we had checked all the brands we are RP for, we viewed some other well established names within the store, some of which were not compliant. The main problem we noticed was that they were missing their RP’s details.
It is a key Regulatory requirement that RP’s regularly survey their product range, especially as the brand owner/manufacture could make a change to a product without informing their RP. It is easy to identify common problems/themes and make any required changes. It also gives a real view of the on-shelf products and their general compliance.
