September 2024

Defra has released its first estimate of Disposal Fees for producers under the Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) scheme for 2025/2026, based on household packaging placed on the market in 2024. REPIC members have already received this forecast, and many attended recent meetings to learn more.

Read below for a handy recap on how these new fees will impact your business.

As we have advised you in PACK ACT 0025, Defra has issued their first estimate of the Disposal Fees that producers will incur under EPR in 2025/2026 for the household packaging that they have placed on the market in 2024. These estimated costs are referred to as illustrative “Base Fees”.  Producers of household and non-household packaging will also continue to finance the recycling of packaging through the Packaging Recovery Note (PRN) system.

Following the release of Defra’s base fees, all REPIC packaging members have been provided with an updated estimated cost forecast to aid their 2025 budgeting and we are pleased that many of our members joined either a REPIC ROOM and/or Defra Stakeholder meeting which explained how the fees have been calculated and the timing of invoices for these. We focus on these new fees again in this issue of Compliance at a Glance.

Illustrative Base fees for 2025/2026

The table below provides Defra’s first release of illustrative base fees for 2025/2026. These will be updated by Defra again in September 2024. Defra has confirmed that producers will be advised of the actual fees that they will incur for the packaging that they have placed on the market in 2024, in the summer of 2025.

The above fees, which include the Scheme Administrator’s costs, and the cost of a Public Information Campaign, will be invoiced to the producer directly by the Scheme Administrator. These are illustrative fees only; they are not calculated using the data that will be used to determine the final fees that producers of household packaging will incur. For this reason, Defra has provided low, medium and high estimates for each packaging material. The high estimate reflects the worst case scenario, as it is based on the lowest modelled tonnage of household packaging placed on the market and the highest estimated Local Authority cost for each packaging material.

The Scheme Administrator will invoice producers directly for their Disposal Fees, commencing in October 2025. Defra has advised that payment will be required immediately, with the option for producers to set up a quarterly direct debit; details of how to do this have not yet been provided. REPIC will continue to invoice our packaging members for their PRNs and registration fees.

Through Compliance at a Glance, our PACK ACTs and our member meetings, we have consistently communicated the importance to our packaging members to budget for these new Disposal Fees. Until the illustrative fees were released, only the total cost of £1.4bn to all UK producers was known. The level of the illustrative base fees provides an incentive for producers to identify opportunities to reduce the quantity of household packaging data that they report for 2024.

Although all REPIC packaging members should have submitted their H1 2024 data already, if you wish to amend your 2024 H1 data, providing you submit this to us by 30th November 2024, we will resubmit it for you free of charge. We can resubmit it after this date, however, this will incur Environment Agency resubmission charges.

Learn how to exclude exported packaging and specific types of non-household packaging from your reports to cut costs. Discover practical steps for categorising branded packaging and ensuring robust evidence for non-household packaging claims.

Reduce your Disposal Fees and increase the accuracy of your data by:

1. Excluding all exported packaging from your data

Remember to exclude:

• shipment and transit packaging you have added in the UK that is exported
• imported packaging that you have reused for export orders
• packaging that you have shipped to Northern Ireland, which is subsequently exported to the Republic of Ireland.

All exported packaging can be excluded from your data, provided you have a robust audit trail to demonstrate that it has been exported.

2. Excluding any UK sourced empty packaging that you have purchased, which you do not supply to any external party

You do not need to report any UK sourced packaging that you use within your business and which you do not supply to another party. This includes any packaging you use for storage of items in your warehouse and remove before they are sent to customers, or packaging you use to send your products between your different sites.

3. Reporting branded and imported packaging used to supply parts to your own engineers as non-household packaging if they use the part when providing a maintenance or repair service to customers

In this situation, you are the business end-user of the packaging, however, you should be able to demonstrate that the packaging has not been supplied, for example, through the systems you operate for your engineers to return their packaging to your sites.

4. Reporting any packaging that is not commonly collected from Local Authorities which you collect from consumers as Consumer Waste

The quantity of packaging you report as Consumer Waste will be deducted by the Scheme Administrator from the quantity of household packaging for which you incur Disposal Fees. Please refer to our August edition of Compliance at a Glance for a detailed explanation of how to do this.

5. Reporting packaging that meets the definition of non-household packaging as non-household packaging, where you have robust evidence to support this

All primary and shipment packaging is household packaging unless it meets the definition of non-household packaging. Primary and shipment packaging may only be reported as non-household packaging if one of the following criteria applies and there is a robust evidence trail in place to demonstrate this:

• The packaging is for a product designed for use by a business or public institution only and the packaging is not likely to be disposed in a household or public bin; or
• The packaging is supplied directly to a business or public institution end-user; or
• You are the importer of the packaging and do not supply it to another party

Please contact us if you would like to read a copy of our previously circulated guidance notes.

Update on developments on packaging sub-materials and implications for our members

Whilst producers may be able to reduce their Disposal Fees through refining their reporting, it is important to remember that the aims of EPR include driving a circular economy and minimising packaging. To incentivise producers to use packaging that is easier to recycle, some household packaging that is placed on the market in 2025 will be modulated based on recyclability. Defra has confirmed that the packaging sub-materials within each packaging material category which will be modulated, will be confirmed in autumn 2024.  We will of course, keep you informed of developments in this area, along with the associated reporting and Disposal Fee implications.

Final call for signed 2023 annual EEE declarations

It is a requirement of the WEEE Regulations that for each compliance year you provide to your compliance scheme a signed declaration confirming that your company information and the EEE data you have submitted in the prior year is true, complete, up to date and accurate in all respects.

The deadline for returning the document has now passed, if you have not already returned your 2023 annual EEE declaration, please log onto the REPIC Portal as soon as possible to download, sign and return the declaration. Please email the signed declaration to Jack at jstudholme@repic.co.uk. As always, if you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact us.