Enacted in 2022, Reese’s Law (P.L. 117-171) mandates federal safety requirements for button cell or coin batteries. This law mandates various requirements for button cell or coin batteries as well as consumer products that have or can use such batteries. The requirements range from performance to labeling and certification. Our team’s previous blog posts on Reese’s Law can be found here and here.
While many manufacturers are aware of the law, there have been a flurry of questions related to the law. For example, consumer product manufacturers and retailers have been surprised to learn that household products with a button cell battery embedded deep within the product (e.g., soldered on the circuit board) and inaccessible to the consumer fall within the scope of this standard and potentially require on product labels. There are still several questions that remain. For example:
- What metric, if any, will the CPSC use to determine if a product is too small to include the warning required by Reese’s law with the long- form text?
- When is a product “too small” for even the abbreviated on-product label?
- Is it left up to the manufacturer to choose whether the long or short label required by Reese’s law is used? How will the CPSC approach enforcement in those cases?
On Thursday, January 25, the CPSC will host a webinar on Reese’s Law, specifically on the button cell and coin battery requirements mandated under Reese’s Law. This webinar will be hosted by Stephen Lee from the U.S. CPSC Small Business Ombudsman Team. We hope that this webinar will provide manufacturers with much needed information to make sure their products comply with Reese’s Law.
To register for the webinar, click here. For more information on the webinar, please contact CPSC’s Small Business Ombudsman Team at sbo@cpsc.gov. CPSC has published business guidance on the requirements for Button Cell and Coin Batteries here and FAQs on Button Cell and Coin Batteries here.