Turkey has introduced a product safety scheme for new cars and automotive products. The Ministry of Science, Industry and Technology ("Ministry") will now actively monitor the market and conduct inspections to ensure they meet technical regulations. The Ministry's monitoring and inspection activities will apply to automotive products and vehicles which are supplied to the market, distributed, exported, imported, assembled, or put into service.
The Regulation on Market Supervision for Automotive Products ("Regulation") was published in Official Gazette number 30340 on 22 February 2018, effective from 22 August 2018.
An automotive product or vehicle is deemed to be supplied to the market if:
- It is advertised for sale or lease (TV, radio, internet, printed media, or other communication tools),
- A certificate of compliance is prepared, or
- An invoice is prepared.
The Ministry will now undertake market supervision activities, including:
- Examine labels and documents outlined in the technical regulations.
- Examine information and/or documents regarding a product's safety (according to Article 5 of the Regulation), if no technical regulation is available.
- Sensory examination.
- Test and inspection.
Non-compliant products fall into two categories:
- Products which do not meet technical regulations, but are not unsafe. For these, producers must provide a compliance plan and rectify the product's failure within the given period.
- Unsafe products.
Administrative fines between 4,000 and 50,000 Turkish Lira will apply for failing to submit a compliance plan or remedy non-conformance.
The Ministry can now take the following measures, subject to the principle of proportionality:
- Ban products from being supplied to the market.
- Pull products from the market.
- Disable products.
- Recall products, if they cannot be made safe, or the producer fails to make them safe.
- Other measures, outlined in technical regulations.
- Ban products from being driven.
Producers can also voluntarily recall risky or non-conforming products from the market, without the Ministry's intervention.
Please see this link for the full text of the Regulation (only available in Turkish).
Information first published in the MA | Gazette, a fortnightly legal update newsletter produced by Moroğlu Arseven.
The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.