What is a delegated act and why does it determine what I must do?

What you must concretely do

What is expected of you

The ESPR (Regulation (EU) 2024/1781) is a framework regulation. This means that the regulation itself sets out how the system works — what a digital product passport is, who must work with it, what rights and obligations apply — but not what specific requirements will apply to a washing machine, a laptop or a smartphone. Those concrete requirements come per product group in a separate document: a delegated act. Article 4 of the ESPR gives the European Commission the power to establish those acts, and Article 8 describes what such an act must contain.

For a company, this means that the ESPR itself is not yet a working instruction. It is the delegated act for the company's own product group that determines which data are mandatory, which QR format applies, and from when. As long as that act does not exist, there is also no concrete obligation to comply with.

Understanding that the regulation only works through a supplementary act

It is wise to bear in mind that "the ESPR" and "the rules for my product" are two different things. The regulation sets out the structure, but only the delegated act for the company's own subcategory makes that structure concrete. For a company with 10 to 100 employees, this means in particular that the search for "the rules" does not stop at the ESPR text itself, but continues to the delegated act that applies to the company's own products. Which products fall under it and why the division per subcategory differs is described in which products in the electronics sector fall under the ESPR and on why different rules apply for different types of equipment.

Following when the company's own product group is due

Article 18 of the ESPR (Regulation (EU) 2024/1781) governs the prioritisation and planning of delegated acts. Not all product groups are dealt with simultaneously; the Commission works with a work plan that indicates for each category when an act will be prepared. For a company, this means that there is no fixed, uniform entry date that applies to all electronics. The date on which the passport becomes mandatory depends on the delegated act for the specific subcategory. A current overview of what is known about this is provided in when the product passport becomes mandatory for electronics.

Reading the content of the company's own delegated act as soon as it is published

Article 8 of the ESPR lists the components that a delegated act must govern: the product information to be provided, the requirements for the data carrier, who may view which data, and the scope of the product group. For a company, this means that the company's own act, once published, provides answers to questions left open by the framework regulation: which data precisely must be in the passport, at what level of detail, and whether certain data are only accessible to competent authorities or also to consumers and recyclers. An initial idea of what to expect in this regard is provided in which data go into the digital product passport and on who may view which data from the product passport.

Where things go wrong in practice

One initial situation is where a company reads the ESPR as a directly applicable list of requirements and concludes that "nothing is yet mandatory", without checking whether the company's own product group already has or will have a delegated act. The regulation exists, but the concrete obligation only arises with the act.

A second situation is the reverse: a company assumes that the requirements for a similar product — for example a washing machine — automatically also apply to its own product, such as a dishwasher. Because each subcategory receives its own delegated act, that assumption is not obvious.

A third situation arises when a company waits for "the final rules" without following the planning in Article 18, and thus starts too late with organising data collection. A delegated act does not appear overnight; it is preceded by a preparation process that often provides signals about the direction early on.

A fourth situation is that an importer or manufacturer uses a delegated act for another product group as a reference framework, for example because it has already been published, and incorrectly assumes that their own act will be identical. The items that Article 8 requires are the same, but the content — which data, which thresholds, which exceptions — varies by category.

A fifth situation is uncertainty about their own position in the supply chain: a company thinks it is small enough to be excluded, while the delegated act makes no such distinction. Whether or not this is the case is described on whether the digital product passport also applies to small businesses.

What you can document

• An overview of their own product groups and subcategories, linked to the status of the corresponding delegated act (in preparation, published, or not yet started).
• A standing routine to periodically check the work plan from Article 18 for changes in the planning for their own category.
• An internal contact point or person responsible for monitoring the publication of their own delegated act and translating its content into their own data collection.
• A note of which data are already available within the company (material composition, repair data, origin of components), so that their collection does not start only when the act becomes mandatory.
• A file containing the sources consulted when determining their own position, including the date of consultation, so that it can later be reconstructed on the basis of which information a decision was made.