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Someone kindly faxed me a questionnaire that has been sent out to certain agents on behalf of a large insurance company regarding the WEEE directive that comes into play next year.
Reading between the lines I see this as a fishing exercise and don’t sell yourselves short here! This is going to cost these people a *fortune* and make no mistake about it, they will try to get us to do this for nothing or next to nothing, they all will, some already tried it with me and I told them where to go.
To handle waste products costs a fortune and this may well kill the recon industry (what’s left of it!) even more than the low cost of new appliances already has done. To do this work you will need the proper waste management licenses as well as a means of disposing of the waste safely and that ain’t cheap, out local councils will charge between £20 and £50 an appliance for disposal alone. Add to that the cost of licences, the administration for all the additional paper records you’ll have to keep and the added labour as well as the costs of running vehicles that can cope with this kind of work and it’s a nightmare!
As for recon’ing machines, why bother? You can sell an appliance for almost the same price as a recon these days and the manufacturer takes the hit for the warranty for not a lot more money.
If you think I’m kidding, I already know of two guys that have been prosecuted for improper waste disposal, another one was featured on this site a few months ago with an (IIRC) £15,000 fine levied for improper waste handling. So the penalties for getting it wrong are very severe.
Insurers want to be able to get rid of the products that they replace and manufacturers, as I understand it, may well be held liable to dispose of products that they produce at the end of their life which could well substantially increase the prices. Of course they will want this done as cheaply as possible, just ensure you don’t get suckered into doing it on the cheap. You can bet a month’s pay that this has not been calculated into the costs when the appliances or policies were sold so there will be little or no money to pay for this service.
It is my view that we, as service companies, are not in the business of waste disposal. Most of us have no idea about that line of work and it’s not what we do, I’ll personally leave it to those that do that for a living thanks, I don’t need the hassle or the costs and since I don’t know the business I wouldn’t know what to charge as I don’t know what it involves, the pitfalls or the hassles I’d face with it.
My take on this exercise is that they are trying to get it done on the cheap, or for next to nothing as we would be a lot cheaper than “proper” waste disposal, or am I being too cynical again?
K.
This was “fired across my bows” over a year ago by the same insurer. They told me at the time this was a legislation that someone could make a lot of money over, if it is managed properly.
I received the paperwork yesterday, and have only just opened it.
If it is that good, why not operate it themselves instead of farming it out, or are they on a cost/viability exercise 1st?
Indeed Alex.
But here’s a thought for you all before you rush off to spend the promised millions that’s to be made…
If it were that easy and potentially that profitable all the local councils and waste management companies would be falling over themselves to do this work since they already have the infra structure to cope with it. They’re not, think on why that is. 😉
K.
A lot of the information is here:
http://www.environment-agency.gov.uk/ne … 4/?lang=_e
and
http://164.36.164.20/sustainability/weee/index.htm
Worth a read, it will probably effect us all in one way or another.
Dave.
WEEE Directive
I have a WEEE directive solution which could help groups of agents in some areas of the country.
The solution involves a social enterprise which recycles as it trains engineers – good for the weee directive and good for the skill shortage. Also good for supplying machines to poor and disadvantaged households.
I have had a feasibility study carried out in my own area and it is a realistic option – even on an offshore island.
Trouble is the larger part needs to be funded through New Deal or similar and I am struggling to get contacts in this area. If anyone has any i’d be pleased to hear from them.
Re: WEEE Directive
hunnyhill wrote:Trouble is the larger part needs to be funded through New Deal or similar and I am struggling to get contacts in this area. If anyone has any i’d be pleased to hear from them.
Which was my point, that without funding from outside the industry it’s not going to happen.
Apparently the manufacturers seem quite complacent about the WEEE Directive for some reason, goodness knows why as it could have a large impact on their business.
At the end of the day, someone is going to have to pay to have all this done and I wonder where the money will come from.
K.
wee
My understanding is this………
If a manufacturer produces 500,000 new cabinetts for retail sale, it will be responsible for the disposal of said appliances at end of life.Assuming this is 1 years production.
Enter insurance company…….offers one stop solution to manufacturer to handle said disposals,manufacturer pays £xx multiplied by 500,000 to the insurance company to deal with the problem .
Insurance company seeks tie up with waste management companies in this venture and between them seek others to do the donkey work.
The insurance company having the infrastructure in place is in a position to offer the service to all manufacturers who see this as an ideal solution as it only costs money.
Therefore the potential earnings for insurance company(plus waste management co.) is £xx multiplied by 1.8 million washers per year that are sold into the sector within the UK.Out of that they have to run the operation …………
If you want part of this pot
DO NOT SELL YOUR SELF SHORTWould like to hear the views of others
regards
ted
Yes, the WEEE Directive, not that I’ve read it as it doesn’t directly affect me and I have no need to be conversant with it, seems to be a bit dubious in places from what I’m told.
However, your understanding is the same as mine on it on the basics, but how will it actually work? Will the manufacturer pay directly for disposal or into a central European fund of some sort and then the money dispersed by government? How is it audited, I mean by that how many appliances are actually sold and how many are actually returned? How does everyone intend to balance the books so to speak?
Sorry if I seem a bit negative on this but I’ve listened to tales of woe from other industries on this as well and there to there seems much confusion and almost universal agreement that to test for WEEE will cost more, lots more, than is currently on the table. Experiments on a similar vein in another EU state, Germany, to try to reclaim browngoods failed miserably. The cost of reclamation exceeded the cost of new product as, to take something apart, involves either labour or huge tooling costs, possibly both. Neither brown or whitegoods industries (from a service point of view) can stand these costs.
I can tell you that going onto council tip sites to inspect and/or reclaim is a nightmare, you have to see it to believe it, I have. We tried it to reclaim refrigerant, it failed, they ended up just crushing them and releasing the gas to atmosphere because they couldn’t aford the reclamation costs. The kicker is, we weren’t making any money at it!
As for inspecting a load of appliances in one go, I can also from first hand experience tell you that unloading a 40 foot wagon of scrap appliance is about as much fun as having a hot needle placed in your eye. Done that too and not made money trying to rework applainces.
Then you have to consider, what are you going to do with the applainces that can be reworked? Who’s going to buy them? When you can buy a new fan oven with timer for £56 delivered to the UK including VAT and import taxes, what’s the point? Grades can be had even cheaper! A washer can easily be bought for under £100 these days, hell I can get a brand spanking new Fagor washer to my door for £125, just think what I could buy that for direct from factory!
So in a climate where you can buy a brand new appliance for less than the price of replacing a module in one, what’s the point of re-working them? Even shipping the things to South Africa or somwhere would cost more than they are worth.
I know that’s a kinda depressing view, but it’s fact.
K.
Hi ken,
the object is to scrap a very high percentage of the appliances,there is a figure for recycling but I don’t know its value.The waste company’s have huge machines which you just feed in a washer and out the other end the waste comes out in the correct binie ferrous,non. rubber/plastic.These machines are already in place and transporting the appliances is not so expensive.The real costs are those incurred collecting the appliances to a central pick up and in the rubber stamping of the inspection to assess as scrap.Lets remember the vast majority are END OF LIFE and as such not worth refurbishing and indeed beyond refurbishing..
ted
I’d have no issue doing inspections at a reasonable and sensible figure, but the figures I have heard mentioned are just far to low to justify it IMHO. Plus I don’t have, nor intend to have, two to four guys free two or three days a week to go and do inspections.
Also, if I (personally for the business) was looking at collections or any transportation of applince it would involve investment in vans etc., which given the low returns on offer I couldn’t stand. The volatility of fuel pricing makes that even worse as you would most likely be tied to a pricing structure for some time, which is probably why anyone proposing this to transportation companies is having a problem.
My plan would just be to shove the buggers in the big machine eating machine, all of them! 😉 At least then they could recycle the “waste” products.
Of course that is just my opinion of it.
But having done similar stuff in the past I will offer one little nugget of advice for anyone thinking on embarking in this field, make sure you have good overalls, rigger gloves, a hard hat and access to a shower for afterwards. 🙄
K.
Re: WEEE & Recycling
Continuing on from Ken’s comments. We tried to get involved with this recycling thing when the fridge recovery thing changed from refrigerant recovery to disposal of complete appliance. Just to collect appliances and take to disposal site needs a waste transfer licence, if you want to take them back to your location for refurbishment/recycling a further waste management licence is required. This does not take into account the fact that you would have to convince the Environment Agency that your site is suitable. I have yet to be convinced that the end result justifies the hasstle.
Re: WEEE & Recycling
bonzaco wrote:I have yet to be convinced that the end result justifies the hasstle.
I have to say I agree with that sentiment entirely.
Especially after humphing appliances off a 40 foot trailer in that past and that in itself takes two hours with four bodies not being delicate about it.
Then there’s the fact that a lot of them can almost walk themselves! 😕
I swear I discovered new lifeforms in some of those 40 footers! 😉
K.
Some guy in Northern Ireland I was talking to the other day. Buy a 40 footer full of Merloni though and you could be about £110-115 a box from what I’m told.
Thing is about that, where’s the money in that for service and what’s the point of trying to rework them?
K.
Re: WEEE & Recycling
Well I was contacted by a training college who are offering almost free NVQ training for businesses regarding WEEE and it is funded by the Goverment. The whole goal for this scheme is that we should recycle the appliance instead of dumping them.
My Point is how the heck we recycle when repairing and then selling them could cost almost same as new machine.Not to mention the new disposable items whirlpool and others are making.What should we do then? Just an example I am sure you guys know better than me;
The bearing seal of a whirlpool washer dryer I had to repair was comming to about £80.the bearing about the same price.So how do I convince the customer to pay for the repair(around £230 I guess) then If they can get a new washer dryer for around £280(not whirlpool)
And in my experiance,hardly anyone spends that much money on a repair to be honest.
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