DGCCRF and CE marking compliance: the inspector's method

Legal powers: demand, not search

An inspector's statutory authority rests on a formal legal instrument called an habilitation. For product safety and conformity, this is grounded in Article L511-6 of the French Consumer Code. The investigative powers are set out in Articles L512-8 to L512-11: the inspector may require the communication of any relevant document in an exploitable format, access to software and algorithms, the opening of packaging, and the taking of samples. An external expert may accompany the inspector under Article L512-17 but may not carry out procedural acts. Access to business premises is permitted between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. without prior authorisation.

What the inspector cannot do without judicial authorisation: search independently. An inspector cannot browse a hard drive, open filing cabinets, or navigate a company's systems. The inspector requests; the company produces. Obstruction of duties (Article L512-4) is a specific criminal offence carrying a €300,000 fine. Powers of search and seizure exist but require the authorisation of a juge des libertés et de la détention and are reserved for the most complex cases handled by national investigation units.

A company therefore retains real latitude over form: the scope of the request, timelines for production, availability of personnel. That latitude is real, but converted into obstruction, it becomes an independent offence whose consequences far exceed those of the original non-conformity.

DGCCRF's mandate: dozens of regulations, millions of references

DGCCRF is the market surveillance authority for a broad range of CE regulations. The current scope covers for example: the Low Voltage Directive (LVD, 2014/35/EU, electrical equipment between 50 V and 1,000 V AC), the Electromagnetic Compatibility Directive (EMC, 2014/30/EU), the Machinery Directive (2006/42/EC) and its successor the Machinery Regulation ((EU) 2023/1230), the Toys Directive (2009/48/EC), the PPE Regulation ((EU) 2016/425), the Construction Products Regulation (CPR, (EU) 305/2011), the ATEX Directive (2014/34/EU), the RoHS Directive (2011/65/EU), the WEEE Directive (2012/19/EU), and the General Product Safety Regulation (GPSR, (EU) 2023/988), in force since December 2024 as the replacement for the GPSD (2001/95/EC).

Two regulations fall primarily under other authorities. For pressure equipment (PED, 2014/68/EU), the DREAL regional authority holds primary jurisdiction. For medical devices (MDR, (EU) 2017/745), it is ANSM. DGCCRF may act in a secondary capacity for both but does not lead sectoral investigations in these areas. Annual controls target the regulatory families where DGCCRF has direct competence, selected on a risk-calibrated basis at national level, rotating across product families from year to year.

One transition deserves close attention in 2025–2027: the shift from the Machinery Directive to the Machinery Regulation. Products placed on the market under Directive 2006/42/EC remain assessed under that text throughout their market presence. New placements from 20 January 2027 onwards fall under Regulation (EU) 2023/1230. A technical file that is correct under the old directive will not automatically be correct under the new regulation for a product launched after that date.

What triggers an inspection

DGCCRF product safety and conformity controls derive from three main channels.

The CPMM (contrôle de la première mise sur le marché) is a periodic assessment of market operators: importers and manufacturers are reviewed at a frequency calibrated to their turnover and the risk profile of their products — annually for high-risk profiles, every three or five years for others. These companies are re-inspected regularly, in a mode closer to audit than to one-off controls.

National sectoral sweeps are decided centrally. The same product families return periodically: a sector that reveals a high infringement rate is reprogrammed for subsequent years until the situation improves. Ministerial priorities and reports from field inspectors also influence programming.

The most formidable trigger is a former employee. A former member of staff who knows the company from the inside knows exactly which products have incomplete technical files and which non-conformities were identified internally without remediation. In the context of a redundancy programme, this risk is concrete and consistently underestimated. More frequent, Signal Conso collects consumer complaints: uneven in quality but useful for targeting in a corps with constrained headcount.

The funnel: from shelf to technical file

The inspector does not start from documentation and work towards the product. The method works in reverse. The funnel examines a large number of products superficially in distribution, identifies those that show a warning signal, and traces the thread back to the corresponding technical files.

The first filter covers five elements visible without opening any packaging: the presence and correctness of the CE marking (required format, position, legibility); the manufacturer's address on the product, mandatory for electrical equipment among others; required normative markings; a lot or serial number; a French-language instruction manual with the required statements. These checks take a few minutes per reference in a retail environment.

The inference chain is systematic: an absent or illegible CE marking, a missing address, an instruction manual in a foreign language only... Each of these signals that the manufacturer did not master the most visible conformity requirements. A manufacturer who cuts corners on the manual cuts corners on the technical file. This signal justifies a deeper investigation, and the inference is reliable in practice.

The maturity assessment: before the file

At the start of an inspection, the inspector's first objective is to assess the company's maturity with respect to its own regulation. Can the company identify the applicable directives without searching? Does it know the current harmonised standards? Are the essential documents accessible quickly?

This test is not in the regulatory text. It shapes the entire inspection. A company that does not know its regulation triggers two simultaneous responses: a pedagogical reflex, with sequenced written follow-up to accompany conformity, and a consumer risk alert. The inspection deepens; document requests broaden.

The priority of market surveillance is not formal compliance with documentation requirements: it is the actual safety of products in the market. The inspector reads the same files as the manufacturer but asks a different question: does this product pose a real risk, and how does the manufacturer manage it? A missing mandatory notice statement is not treated in the same way as an identifiable electrical safety defect in the test reports.

The technical file: declaration of conformity, then the four-point grid

The EU declaration of conformity (DoC) is the first document examined. It references the applicable directives, the chosen standards and their versions, and the date of market placement. Four immediate checks: the signature (an unsigned document is void); consistency of the date with the product's market placement, not the date of the last internal review; whether the standard versions cited are those in force; and whether the text is consistent with the applicable directive or regulation. A DoC signed late, citing obsolete standard versions, or referencing a directive subsequently revised, is the signal that opens the full technical file.

Test reports are read against a four-point grid:

1. Have the right clauses of the standard been tested? Are clauses declared non-applicable credibly justified?
2. Was the laboratory specifically accredited for these tests — not accredited in general for a neighbouring field?
3. Is the standard version tested the one in force at the date of the product's market placement?
4. Is the product submitted to testing the declared product — correct reference, correct hardware revision?

These four checks apply to all reports in the file, whether from an external accredited laboratory or an internal one. A report from a reputable external accredited laboratory remains the least contestable document in a technical file. This is why outsourcing critical tests, even when internal capacity exists, is the most robust strategy in the event of an inspection or dispute.

The most common documentation failures

Obsolete standard versions without gap analysis are the most widespread failure. This is particularly acute for manufacturers who placed machinery on the market under Directive 2006/42/EC and have not anticipated what Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 will require for new placements from January 2027. Their existing dossiers are correct for current products; new launches will be assessed under a different framework if no updating work is initiated.

Scope manipulation is the most revealing failure. Standard clauses declared non-applicable without justification are generally not an oversight: they are a deliberate choice to avoid testing a point likely to reveal a non-conformity. The implicit arrangement between manufacturer and external laboratory to exclude certain test items from the programme is a documented practice. The inspector recognises this pattern and distinguishes it from a simple omission.

Extended conformity without individual testing is consistently flagged: declaring fifty products conformant on the basis of a single test conducted on one representative model is unacceptable, regardless of the contractual arrangement with the laboratory. This has been observed in practice, particularly with laboratories whose standard approach involves testing one representative and extending conformity to a declared "structurally identical" range.

Fragmented R&D documentation, organised by component rather than by finished product, creates a systemic problem: it is impossible to reconstitute the complete technical file for a given product without searching component by component through archives organised for engineering needs, not conformity needs. This is not in itself an infringement, but it ensures that gaps will go undetected until an inspection.

The physical manufacturer and the legal manufacturer

The physical manufacturer has the factory and controls the design files. The legal manufacturer, the importer who places its brand on a product designed by a third party, is the signatory of the EU declaration of conformity and the regulatory responsible party before the surveillance authority. In theory, a contractual arrangement gives the importer access to the physical manufacturer's technical file. In practice, importers frequently lack access to the original design drawings, cannot independently verify test reports, and do not know which components have been modified since the last test.

This profile concentrates a disproportionate share of documentation failures. In a control, the importer is the signatory of a declaration of conformity whose technical content it cannot justify. Regulatory responsibility is full; technical control of the product is partial or absent.

Follow-up: from a warning to criminal procedure

A formal warning is the first possible outcome after a non-conformity is identified. Its educational character does not make it inconsequential: it officially records that the manufacturer or operator was notified of the problem on a specific date. Any repeat of the infraction after a warning is an infraction committed with prior knowledge, which establishes intent and significantly increases the applicable enforcement exposure.

The administrative injunction (articles L521-1 to L521-3 of the Consumer Code) is a corrective measure: it requires compliance within a set deadline, following an adversarial procedure. It may be accompanied by a daily penalty of up to €3,000 per day, capped at €300,000.

Administrative fines and criminal proceedings are repressive measures. They can be initiated simultaneously with the administrative procedure from the initial finding, without waiting for an injunction to fail.

Both the administrative fine and the injunction may be accompanied by forced publication: disclosure on the DGCCRF website, or by the company itself on its own website or in the press. Reputational consequences often exceed the financial penalty, particularly with professional clients who have a legal obligation to audit their suppliers.

Market withdrawal and product recall are provided for in articles L521-4 et seq. of the Consumer Code; article R521-23 designates the departmental prefect as the competent authority to issue the order.

The hours after the inspection

An inspection that ends without apparent incident is not closed. The substantive work, critical review of the retrieved technical file and drafting of the official report, takes place at the inspector's desk after the visit. Requests for additional documents and product samples for laboratory testing may follow in the subsequent weeks.

The immediate priority for the compliance officer after the inspector's departure is to identify, internally, the known non-conformities in the inspected products before the inspector finds them in a cold review. This information reaches senior management without delay. Where non-conformities are identified, initiating corrective action before a formal injunction is opened is viewed favourably: DGCCRF prefers voluntary conformity to coercive procedures.

For investors: the registry that does not exist

There is no public registry of DGCCRF product safety and conformity inspections in France, with the exception of hygiene controls in the food service sector, now handled by the veterinary services. An acquirer cannot verify whether a company has been inspected, how often, or with what outcomes.

What can be obtained in documentary due diligence: all correspondence with @*.gouv.fr addresses over the past ten years. This request surfaces exchanges with DGCCRF if the company responds in good faith: warnings, document requests, injunctions. The absence of correspondence does not prove the absence of controls: it may reflect an absence of written follow-up actions or a history of inspections without documented incident.

The useful distinction: an avertissement (warning notice) documents a non-conformity at a specific date and establishes the company's knowledge of the problem. An injonction (injunction) creates a binding obligation with a deadline and potential daily penalties. The presence of an injunction in a target company's file indicates that an inspector judged the non-conformity serious enough to open a formal adversarial procedure and leave a legally binding record. That is different information from a warning notice, and it should be assessed differently in a regulatory risk evaluation.