Under the relevant legislation, the General Directorate of Occupational Health and Safety is the competent authority to carry out the following activities:
- inspecting certain products that are produced or imported;
- conducting market surveillance, and
- determining the procedures and principles in the abovementioned matters.
Market Surveillance and Inspection Activities
The General Directorate carries out market surveillance and inspection activities through the inspection personnel authorised by the Ministry. It imposes administrative measures and fines specified in the Product Safety and Technical Regulations Law No. 7223. These measures and fines are exercised subject to the procedures and principles regarding inspection and the duties, powers and responsibilities specified in Articles 15 and 16 of the Law regarding the products that do not comply with the technical regulation and/or are deemed unsafe.
The Ministry’s market surveillance and inspection personnel can visit active companies. The personnel can record that relevant products are manufactured or introduced to the market by placing a trademark on the product. They can further inspect if the product is designed or manufactured and the manufacturing of the product is completed as defined in Article 3/1-(g) of the Product Safety and Technical Regulations Law No. 7223.
Products That Do Not Comply with Technical and Safety Regulations
The products are displayed and introduced to the market at businesses, and the documents taken during the inspection are recorded. As a result of the examination of the documents, it can also be determined that introducing the products into the market violates technical regulations because it has been done before completing specific assessment procedures. For example, Article 20/1- (b) of the Personal Protective Equipment Regulation requires assessments of personal protective equipment such as motorcycle equipment.
Documents That the Ministry Can Request
According to the Regulation on Market Surveillance and Inspection of the Ministry of Labour and Social Security published in the Official Gazette dated 21/10/2022 and numbered 31990, the Ministry may request the submission of the following documents:
- all kinds of information and documents (invoice, delivery note, etc.) showing the application made to the relevant assessment body;
- the documents issued within the scope of this application;
- the annual production capacity, production and warehouse addresses;
- the amount of products in the warehouses;
- the amount of products supplied to the market;
- the customs declaration samples of the products in case the products are imported and supplied to the market with a trademark;
- the corrective action plan, and
- written opinion (defence) regarding the specific issue.
Failing to Comply with the Ministry’s Orders
If the information and documents requested by the Ministry are not submitted or submitted incompletely, Article 7/1-(ı) of Law No. 7223 applies:
“The manufacturer fulfils the instructions of the competent authority in the activities carried out to eliminate the risks carried by the products introduced to the market and provides all necessary information and documents showing the conformity of the products to the competent authority in Turkish or in another language acceptable to the competent authority.”
If this article is violated, administrative fines are imposed, and inspection is repeated with law enforcement agents.
Article 13/1 of the same law:
“For the product to be supplied to the market, to be kept on the market or put into service, the mandatory conformity assessment procedures stipulated in the technical regulation for this product must be completed and concluded positively.”
Once the necessary examination of the products and the corrective actions to be carried out by the company are completed, it may be decided to urgently stop the introduction of the products on the market, the sale and display of the products.