Reach Delivery International is launching a new online document delivery service to help US chemical manufacturers and distributors comply with new REACH regulations regarding Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDS).
MSDS are now known under GHS as Safety Data Sheets (SDS), that now affect them whenever they ship chemicals to any customers based within the European Union.
To comply with REACH legislation, any US company that ships chemicals to or within the European Union will now need to guarantee the secure delivery of SDS and associated documentation to their customers. They will also be responsible for keeping these documents up to date in the event of any changes or clarifications.
These companies will no longer be able to simply publish these documents for customers to access on a website or in a catalogue of SDSs. Sending the latest SDS in the post or by email will also be inadequate as companies will not be able to guarantee delivery, nor record proof of delivery without significant additional time, effort and cost. In addition, traditional delivery methods will not provide any automated process to accommodate the REACH regulations when supplying SDS updates to customers. And, this is not a challenge that individual organisations will be able to solve by developing a proprietary document delivery system, as this would be unworkable in a global industry.
Malcolm Carroll director at REACH Delivery International commented: “The first phase of REACH registration was finalised at the end of November. This next phase will involve American manufacturers and exporters of chemicals considering how they tackle their requirements around the delivery and receipt of Safety Data Sheets. They will have to ensure that up to date documents are delivered to their EU customers and they subsequently keep their customers updated with the very latest SDS to comply with regulations. Reach Delivery provides a single point of access for delivery and receipt of Safety Data Sheets and provides compliance support, not only to the chemical industry but to all downstream users.”
Jo Lloyd, Director at REACH Ready commented: “With the completion of the first phase of REACH registration, many manufacturers and importers of chemicals are now revising their SDSs to incorporate new hazard and risk information they have learned during registration or in reclassifying their substances according to the new CLP regulation. The new year will see a flurry of revised SDSs enter the supply chain and keeping track of what has been sent to which customer and ensuring ‘delivery’ will bring its own headaches – regulators have been quite clear that suppliers are now responsible for delivering revised SDSs to their customers. As part of our Matchmaker service, REACHReady is keen to promote tools that help facilitate REACH and CLP compliance and welcomes this new management product from REACH Delivery, a REACHReady Approved Supplier”.
REACH Delivery is an online service which enables the electronic delivery, receipt, control, update, audit and tracking of Safety Data Sheets in line with the REACH regulations. It is a free to use service, with an optional ‘pay as you use’ area for users wanting to send documents externally, who will then pay a low ‘per document’ fee. Recipients of the SDS and other documents are able to use the service completely free of charge.
The REACH Delivery set up and registration process is simple. Once registered users can send securely the latest versions of SDS directly to their EU customers’ desktops and receive proof of delivery and receipt as soon as their customer accesses the documents. An audit trail of all activities related to their documents is provided to demonstrate compliance and reduce the risk of any potential enforcement and legal action.
New US legislation, similar to REACH, is also being considered for shipments into the US markets. The flexibility and global nature of REACH Delivery is intended to meet the requirements of this legislation when required, In the meantime US REACH Delivery users benefit by being able to distribute the SDS throughout their company, via REACH Delivery, free of charge, ensuring the very latest SDS are always being used across their organisation. The system notifies them immediately of any changes to any information in their SDS, with an updated version replacing the previous one so only the very latest version is in use. All SDS will be held securely on a central repository, accessible only by the document owner or a recipient to whom they have sent the document. Users can also, optionally, elect to store copies of documents locally on their own machines, for online or offline operations and still guarantee that these documents are automatically kept up to date.
Malcolm Carroll director at Reach Delivery commented: “The REACH regulations affect many American companies and are quite complex and challenging. REACH Delivery aims to eradicate the headaches around sending and receiving Safety Data Sheets. It provides a simple and effective way for companies all around the world to meet the challenges of REACH compliance in respect of delivering documents to customers. It also allows organisations to manage their own internal operations in ensuring the use of only current information and providing consistency across all operational areas.
“The system is easy to use and free of charge unless you send documents externally – customers can scale up depending on their needs. It offers an unrivalled service and provides a sophisticated many to many communication environment for document delivery, management and REACH compliance. The service has received some great initial feedback from the Chemical Industry and we anticipate REACH Delivery will quickly become the defacto standard for SDS delivery worldwide,” he added.
REACH Delivery International is the provider of the REACH Delivery electronic Safety Data Sheet delivery service. The company focuses entirely on providing solutions to assist their clients in meeting REACH regulations and is a REACH Ready approved supplier.
In addition to marketing and maintaining the REACH Delivery service, the company provides implementation and training services to support the operations.
REACH Delivery is part of the Mpower1 group of companies (www.mpower1.com)
REACH is a new European Community Regulation on chemicals and their safe use (EC 1907/2006). It deals with the Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemical substances. The REACH regulations entered into force on 1 June 2007.
The aim of REACH is to improve the protection of human health and the environment through the better and earlier identification of the intrinsic properties of chemical substances. At the same time, innovative capability and competitiveness of the EU chemicals industry should be enhanced. The benefits of the REACH system will come gradually, as more and more substances are phased into REACH.
The REACH Regulation gives greater responsibility to industry to manage the risks from chemicals and to provide safety information on the substances. Manufacturers and importers will be required to gather information on the properties of their chemical substances, which will allow their safe handling, and to register the information in a central database run by the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) in Helsinki. The Agency will act as the central point in the REACH system: it will manage the databases necessary to operate the system, co-ordinate the in-depth evaluation of suspicious chemicals and run a public database in which consumers and professionals can find hazard information
REACHReady is a subsidiary business of the Chemical Industries Association, set up in 2006 to help companies deal with the REACH regulation. In 2009 REACHReady expanded it scope to offer help and support to company’s on the implementation of the EU CLP regulation. REACHReady has over 7000 subscribers taking advantage of REACHReady’s Helpdesk, Training & Events, Reassurance consulting or auditing services as well as news and legislative alert. REACHReady also runs a Matchmaker service where it can find reliable “REACHReady Approved” organisations to provide the services a company may need to conduct the tasks required of them by REACH or CLP, More information about REACHReady is available on www.reachready.co.uk and REACHReady can be contacted on enquiries@reachready.co.uk or telephone +44(0)20 7901 1444
