EU Compliance Checker
From 12 August 2026 the EU packaging rules (PPWR) make you a packaging producer in every member state you sell into — one registration per country — and the GPSR already requires an EU-based operator for every product on the EU market. This checker tells you, in plain English, what applies to you: your GPSR Responsible Person duty, your EPR categories, and your per-country packaging registrations. Free, no signup for the answer.
Your business — seven questions
Answer once. Your duties update instantly.
Your EU duties
GPSR, EPR categories and your per-country packaging registrations.
Packaging registrations — one per country
| Country | Register / scheme | Authorised rep | Status |
|---|
Full detail — including the notes and thresholds for each country — is in our EU packaging EPR registration directory. A delayed registry is not a free pass: you still owe registration, so diary the country and check it monthly.
Other EPR categories
What your marketplaces will ask for
Your checklist
What a Responsible Person costs. Published prices we found on 12 November 2026 start at about €150 a year for a basic service and run to about €2,300 a year for EU + UK cover, depending on the provider and how many products you have; a few providers charge a one-off fee per product category instead (around €400–600). These are published prices, not quotes and not a recommendation — get a written quote for your exact products, and read what the fee covers before you sign. ZAXIUS does not sell Responsible Person services.
Rule sources: Regulation (EU) 2025/40 (PPWR) — EUR-Lex, Regulation (EU) 2023/988 (GPSR) — EUR-Lex, European Commission — EPR obligations by member state, Amazon — EPR: registration for packaging in the EU (delayed countries), SellerMagnet — Amazon EPR packaging ERN 2026 and GOV.UK — EPR for packaging: what you must do as a small producer. Responsible Person prices: eugpsr.de — six providers compared and Euverify — authorised representative costs.
Rules verified 12 November 2026. Registries and marketplace rules change — the registry page for each country is the final word.
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How to use this checker
Answer seven questions
Where you are based, which EU countries you sell into, your marketplaces, what you sell, your role, whether you already have an EU operator, and whether your packaging touches food.
Read your GPSR verdict first
If you are based outside the EU and have no EU operator, you cannot legally place products on the EU market until you appoint one. That is the hard stop — fix it before anything else.
Work the checklist country by country
Register as a packaging producer in every country you sell into, add the extra categories (WEEE, batteries, textiles) where they apply, and give your numbers to each marketplace.
What binds you on 12 August 2026 — and what comes later
On 12 August 2026 two things bind you. First, registration: under the PPWR you must register as a packaging producer in every member state you sell into, and marketplaces must collect your registration number. Second, PFAS: the PPWR sets limits for PFAS in food-contact packaging from the same date (25 ppb, 250 ppb and 50 ppm depending on the substance) — check with your packaging supplier if your packaging touches food. The PPWR also keeps the existing heavy-metals limit of 100 mg/kg.
Later dates are not your problem yet. Harmonised packaging labelling follows in 2028, recyclability performance grades A, B and C apply from 2030, and Grade C packaging loses market access entirely on 1 January 2038. Do not let a 2030 deadline distract you from the 2026 registration — the marketplaces are enforcing registration now.
| Date | What binds you |
|---|---|
| 13 Dec 2024 | GPSR applies — an EU economic operator must be responsible for every product (Art. 16); listing information rules (Art. 19) |
| 12 Aug 2026 | PPWR applies — register as a packaging producer in every member state sold into; PFAS limits in food-contact packaging |
| 2028 | Harmonised packaging labelling |
| 2030 | Recyclability performance grades A, B and C apply |
| 1 Jan 2038 | Grade C packaging loses market access |
What the marketplaces do
Amazon collects one EPR registration number per country and per category, and can hide listings or block sales without a valid number. Five countries' registries are delayed — Belgium, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands and Poland — so Amazon cannot yet collect a number there; it publishes the delay on its own EPR page. Your number must appear in Amazon's registry first (allow 72 hours after registering), then Amazon takes up to 5 working days to verify it. Pay on Behalf is not a substitute: Amazon paying the EPR fees for you does not replace your own registration. eBay can hide listings that lack a valid registration number. Etsy and TikTok Shop follow each marketplace's own compliance flow — check their seller compliance pages for the EPR fields on your listings. On your own website nobody collects the number, but the duty still applies to you directly.
EU Compliance Checker: what this tool models
This EU compliance checker answers three questions for a non-EU seller shipping into Europe: do you need an EU Responsible Person under the GPSR, which EPR categories apply to what you sell, and which packaging registry you must join in each country you sell into. It uses the PPWR (Regulation (EU) 2025/40, applying 12 August 2026), the GPSR (Regulation (EU) 2023/988, applying 13 December 2024), the Batteries Regulation (EU) 2023/1542 and the textiles EPR rule (Regulation (EU) 2025/1892), with the per-country registry detail from the European Commission's EPR table, verified 12 November 2026. Where a country's registry detail is genuinely unpublished — Romania — it says so, instead of guessing.
What it deliberately does not model: your exact volumes (which decide whether a small-producer threshold applies), the fee each PRO charges (which follows the volumes you report), and whether a marketplace has opened its EPR field for a delayed country yet. Run it before you list a new EU country, before 12 August 2026, and every time you add a marketplace or a product category. The full per-country detail is in our EU packaging EPR registration directory.
General information only — not legal advice. This page summarises Regulation (EU) 2025/40 (PPWR) and Regulation (EU) 2023/988 (GPSR) for sellers. It is not legal advice, and it is not a substitute for a lawyer or a compliance adviser. Rules change — always check the official registry or the EUR-Lex text before you register or ship. ZAXIUS does not sell Responsible Person or authorised representative services.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need to register in every EU country I sell to?
What is an EU Responsible Person, and do I need one?
I am a small seller — do these rules still apply to me?
Amazon pays EPR fees on my behalf — am I covered?
What happens if I sell into the EU without registering?
What does a Responsible Person cost?
The registration is the easy part — knowing you owe it is the hard part
ZAXIUS runs marketplace operations for sellers across Amazon, eBay, Etsy, Walmart and TikTok Shop — including the compliance paperwork that keeps listings live. Start with a free 25-point audit of your store, or see our e-commerce operations management service.
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