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Australia: New mandatory information standard for toppling furniture is published

MAY 2024 - HARDLINES

On 3 May 2024, the Australian Government published a new mandatory information standard for toppling furniture. The mandatory standard, Consumer Goods (Toppling Furniture) Information Standard¹, requires suppliers to provide safety warnings and advice about how to reduce toppling furniture incidents to consumers before, during, and after purchasing furniture.

According to the definition given in the standard, the requirement will apply to the following furniture categories:

• Category 1 - A clothing storage unit or bookcase with a height of 686 mm or more. A clothing storage unit is an item of furniture intended to primarily store clothes. It has one or more doors or drawers.
• Category 2 - Entertainment units of any height typically used for housing televisions, home theatre systems, or gaming consoles.
• Category 3 - Hall tables, display cabinets, buffets, and sideboards with a height 686 mm or greater.

Excluded from the scope are:

• furniture that was bought by a consumer and is being resold.
• second-hand furniture, including furniture that was previously bought and used commercially.
• furniture designed to be fastened to a wall or other structure and that can’t be used unless it’s attached.

According to the standard, suppliers of in-scope furniture must warn consumers about the risk of toppling furniture by:

• attaching permanent warning labels to furniture, and
• displaying point of sale warnings, both instore and online, and
• including information about the risk of toppling furniture in any instruction manuals provided with storage furniture.

The permanent warning label must be durable, lasting the lifetime of the product, and attached where it will be visible when the toppling furniture is empty.

Point of sale warnings, when sold online, shall be included in the description of the furniture provided by the platform; when sold in-store, must be displayed on or near the products. This may be a hang or swing tag attached to the furniture, a placard placed near or on top of the furniture, or a removable sticker attached to the furniture. 

Depending on the furniture category and where the furniture is sold (online or in-store), the information required is slightly different; more details are available in the standard. The Authority has provided some examples of compliant permanent warning labels and point of sale warnings in its published guidance²:

Example of a compliant warning label for category 1 and 3 furniture (Permanent on-product warning)	Example of a compliant warning label for category 2 furniture (Permanent on-product warning)
Example of a compliant hang tag for category 1 and 3 furniture (Point of sale warning)	Example of a compliant hang tag for category 2 furniture (Point of sale warning)

Suppliers will have a 12-month transition period to implement the new information and labeling requirements. This mandatory information standard will come into effect on 4 May 2025.

[1] Consumer Goods (Toppling Furniture) Information Standard

[2] Authority Guidance on Toppling Furniture

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