Standing point of the EC Mandate M/549 to CEN

Find the pdf version here.

On September 21^st, 2016, the European Commission sent a “standardisation request to the European Committee for Standardisation (CEN) as regards lifts and safety components for lifts in support of Directive 2014/33/EU (Lifts Directive) of the European Parliament and Council”. The EC Mandate M/549 – this is how the request is commonly known – asks CEN to draft harmonised standards (hEN) supporting the implementation of the essential health and safety requirements (EHSRs) inserted in Annex I of the Lifts Directive 2014/33/EU and to align the existing hENs to the same Directive. In addition, Annex I of the Mandate clearly states the need to favour a fair competition in the internal market, as well as to prevent from restricting “access to relevant diagnostic data, related interfaces and tools”. The deadline for the adoption of the new hENs by CEN was established within eighteen months from the notification of the Mandate, i.e. by the end of March 2018.

This is not the first time that the EC asked CEN to intervene on data accessibility. At the beginning of 2008, the Lifts Working Group of the EC stated the importance of free access to data by the maintenance companies. The position had been highly encouraged by a joint letter to the EC signed by EFESME, the European Lift Component Association (ELCA) and NORMAPME (the association representing SMEs in standardisation prior to the establishment of Small Business Standards) in October 2007. In the joint letter, the three organisations opposed the PESSRAL (Programmable Electronic Systems in Safety Applications for Lifts) by accusing it to hamper competition in the lift maintenance market.  As a result, in April 2008 Mr Pedro Ortún from the EC sent a letter to CEN presenting the position of the LWG and presenting a formal request to consequently amend the existing hENs. Despite the attempts of mediation started in 2008, CEN eventually did not sufficiently and satisfactorily take into account the request of the EC, that are in line with the needs of lift SMEs. As the 2016 request is even quoting some parts of the text of Ortún’s letter, it is evident that the EC did not consider the current standards a sufficient guarantee for the availability of all the instructions and service tools needed for a safe operation of lifts, once they are put into service.

It is clear that a correct implementation of the requests of the EC is fundamental for those companies operating in the lift maintenance and repair – a market mostly consisting of SMEs. Therefore, since the acceptance of the Mandate by CEN, SBS, with the support of EFESME, strictly followed the implementing process. Already in the first phase of the process, the two associations highlighted some incongruences from the CEN side, starting from the delay in the presentation of the Work Programme – the Mandate specifies also the deadline for presenting the WP and reporting – to the EC. Backed by the EC, SBS and EFESME started a dialogue with the CEN TC 10 in which the two parts confronted their views on the implementation of the Mandate. During a meeting in late September, the CEN TC suggested SBS to present concrete proposals to be discussed within the CEN TC10 WG1. As a consequence, the EFESME experts drafted two technical documents that SBS submitted to the CEN TC10 in early December.

As ensured by CEN during the meeting of the EC Lifts Working Group on January 17^th, 2018, the documents were discussed during the WG1 meeting in Milan on March 14^th – 15^th, 2018. All the comments raised by SBS were quickly analysed in order to clarify the real meaning of each request. This allowed a common understanding of the issues at stake, for the WG1 Convenor to be able to provide, for each item, his first proposed answer according to his own point of view. These preliminary answers should be circulated in early May to all the WG1 experts for comments, which will be part of the agenda of the next meeting, scheduled in Brussels on June 27^th – 28^th.

The implementation process is still ongoing, but this time the conditions for SMEs seem to be more positive than ten years ago, taking into account the numerous references in the draft of the “Guide to the application of the Lift Directive 2014/34/EU”, that is supposed to be released soon. The text supports many of our requests of modification, such as those listed below:

• Paragraph 35 – “The Lifts Directive requires the installer of the lift to design the lift in such a way that maintenance, inspection and rescue operations can be carried out safely. The lift installer must also provide the necessary special tools and appropriate instructions for maintenance, inspection, repair, periodic checks and rescue operations that must accompany the lift in order to be available on site”;
• Paragraph 183 – “Paragraph (e) of point 1.1.2 of the Machinery Directive implies that, when special equipment, such as special tools or software is necessary for safe and effective execution of maintenance or rescue operations, such equipment should be supplied with the lift by the installer when the lift is placed on the market”;
• Paragraph 212 – “If special equipment is needed to release and evacuate trapped people, it must be supplied with the lift by the installer when the lift is placed on the market so that it can be kept permanently available on site. However, in certain extreme cases (for example, the failure of the suspension or support system), it may be necessary for the rescue service to use special equipment that is not supplied with the lift installation and that cannot be kept on site”;
• Paragraph 221 – “In order to ensure that the necessary information is available to the people in charge of the in-service inspection and maintenance of the lift, the relevant instructions for the inspection purposes and maintenance of the safety components that are incorporated into the lift, including instructions for the use of any special equipment or software that may be needed, must be included in the instruction manual for the lift referred to in point 6.2 below, in the language determined by the Member State concerned and easily understood”;
• Paragraph 222 – “The lift installer’s instructions must provide the information on the use of any special equipment, such as special tools or software, necessary for the safe and effective maintenance of the lift or for rescue operations”.

SBS and EFESME will continue following the implementation of the EC Mandate M/549 to CEN, in defence and support of lift SMEs reasonable expectations.