Small businesses ignorant on WEEE - is yours one of them?

A year after the laws came into force, most businesses still don’t know they exist (article by Tom Young, Computing, 12 Feb 08)

The Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) Directive may be touted as a cost for suppliers, but unless organisations get their asset registers in order, it will also create a significant cost for UK business.

Such policies as WEEE assume a level of asset management far beyond that achieved by the majority of UK business. Unless supplying a like for like replacement, suppliers will only remove and dispose of equipment they have delivered initially. How many UK businesses can accurately identify the location of their WEEE equipment within the organisation and confirm when it was purchased and from whom? Without such information, just which company do they expect to handle the free disposal?

Organisations need to implement sound asset disposal procedures. Linking the asset register to a document management system will ensure a scanned WEEE certificate is linked to a disposed asset, providing the required audit trail. Each asset can be recorded alongside the supplier’s name and email address, enabling swift supplier contact when disposal is due.

UK business is already complaining about excessive red tape, perhaps why the WEEE Directive introduction in July 2007 was so downplayed. But a belief that the onus of WEEE is firmly on equipment suppliers could be an expensive mistake.