EU – Guidance on Requirements for UV Protective Clothing Category 1 PPE

Vol. 1063 | 11 Mar 2019

UV Protective clothing is considered as Category 1 Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) under the scope of the EU Regulation for Personal Protective Equipment 2016/425.

This requires that the manufacturer or EU distributor should prepare a technical file, which should contain the following information as required by Annex I as a minimum.

1. Risk Assessment

The file should contain the name of the product and the protection offered. The manufacturer or EU distributor should have performed the assessment of the risks against which the PPE is intended to protect, including a design assessment. The requirements in EN 13758-2 is recommended.

2. Testing

Harmonised standards have not been applied – but it is recommended to apply recognized standards BS EN 13758-2 for apparel and BS 8466 for hats. Other suitable international standards may be used to monitor conformance, e.g., AS/NZS 4399, AATCC 183.

The Technical File should contain the relevant reports on the tests carried out to verify the conformity of the PPE with the applicable requirements.

The fabric or garment should have a minimum requirement of at least UPF 40.

3. Lifetime of the Product/Performance Assessment

There should be an assessment of the performance of the protection offered by the garment over lifetime.

This may include an assessment of the UV protection after expected number of wash cycles to ensure that the garment still offers the claimed protection.

A description of the means used by the manufacturer during the production of the PPE to ensure the conformity of the PPE produced with the design specifications to monitor that protection is continued. This may include a testing program on fabric.

4. Labelling

The manufacturer shall affix following information to each item.

• CE Mark

It is required that the CE mark is provided on a permanently sewn in label.

A link to CE marks is below
https://ec.europa.eu/growth/single-market/ce-marking_en

However, the use of hangtags (or similar) to provide the other required information is not prevented by the legislation.

• Batch/serial/type or other mark for identification purposes
• Name, registered trade name and address of manufacturer or supplier
• Information pictogram (if applicable – see user information below)
• Cleaning instructions

User Information

The location of the User Information may be indicated with the pictogram as below

The consumer should be provided with certain information

• Name and Address of the distributor
• A statement that the product complies with the EU Regulation for Personal Protective Equipment 2016/425
• Model number
• Size
• A set of instructions for cleaning and use
• Instructions on how to recognise ageing and loss of performance in the product. This may be a statement of the type ‘Check the garment periodically for any signs of holes or wear which may impair the protection offered by the garment’
• Cleaning instructions (if a maximum number of wash cycles are indicated, the testing must be carried out after this number of wash cycles)

5. Technical File

The requirement is that the Technical File should be retained for 10 years.

For additional information please contact:

Dave Smith
dave.smith@intertek.com