Seoul City "Up to 100% Support for Safety Inspection Fees of Small Business Products"

Applications Open Starting Tomorrow

[Asia Economy Reporter Kiho Sung] The Seoul Metropolitan Government announced on the 31st that it supports inspection fees for small business owners' products so that consumers can use household goods with confidence. This year, to enhance convenience and participation for small business owners, the number of application times has been increased from once a year to three times a year, and the number of inspection agencies has been increased from two to three. The first application date is from the 1st of next month.

Safety inspection refers to the inspection conducted by manufacturers or importers of products under the "Electrical Appliances and Household Goods Safety Control Act" and the "Special Act on Safety of Children’s Products" to verify whether the products comply with safety standards and contain no harmful substances.

The supported items for safety inspection fees are ▲household textile products (clothing, bags, etc.) ▲leather products (shoes, gloves, etc.) ▲contact metal accessories (rings, necklaces, etc.) ▲children’s textile products (clothing, hats, etc.) ▲children’s leather products (bags, footwear, etc.) ▲children’s accessories (all accessories with character illustrations) ▲children’s furniture ▲infant textile products (cloth diapers, bibs, etc.) ▲toys, totaling 9 categories. Most of these are items frequently used in daily life by infants and children that have significant physical contact.

There are three types of small business owners’ products subject to safety inspection. First, safety confirmation products that must be inspected, reported, and then sold mandatorily; second, supplier conformity confirmation products that sellers inspect and label safety themselves before selling; and third, safety standard compliance products that can be sold without separate inspection. Seoul City is promoting the elimination of safety blind spots in household goods by supporting inspection fees even for products outside the mandatory inspection scope.

Since 2016, the city has been supporting 30% to 100% of the safety inspection costs for products closely related to daily life according to the item, to help small business owners distribute their products. To date, a total of 2,383 inspections have been supported.

Applications for inspection fees can be made by calling one of the three agencies contracted with the city?‘Korea Apparel Testing & Research Institute’, ‘Korea Conformity Laboratories’, or ‘FITI Testing & Research Institute’?starting from 9 a.m. on the 1st of next month. The city supports inspection fees only for cases where the city requests the inspection application.

Especially from this year, to improve convenience for small business owners, the city added ‘FITI Testing & Research Institute’ to the existing two inspection agencies, increasing the total number of inspection agencies to three. The application period has also been expanded from once a year to three times a year?in February, June, and September?so that small business owners handling seasonal concentrated products can receive prompt support.

Jae-yong Park, Director of Labor, Fairness, and Coexistence Policy at Seoul City, said, “Through support for safety inspection fees, we will spread the perception that small business owners’ products are also verified as safe products, and help improve the competitiveness of small business owners and create a healthy market environment.”