https://www.engadget.com/2227720/eu-right-to-repair-directive-kicks-in-today/
July 31, 2026 marks the start of a new era for the Right to Repair movement, at least for citizens in the European Union. It's the deadline for when the bloc's directive on repairs goes live for its 27 member nations. And while today is more of a political and procedural milestone than a practical one, it opens the door for major changes in how people maintain their hardware. It's all part of the bloc's push for a fairer, and more sustainable economy.
Essentially, the directive requires manufacturers to offer repairs for faulty products within a "reasonable time" and "at a reasonable price." Manufacturers will also need to publish repair manuals — for free — and offer clear pricing for spare parts. If a piece of equipment is repaired, then buyers will also be able to have their legal warranty period extended for an additional year.
At present, the rules cover repairs for major household appliances, such as washing machines, dryers, dishwashers and refrigerators. On the technology side, the rules apply to smartphones, tablets, server equipment, as well as e-bikes and e-scooters. A notable admission from the list is vacuum cleaners, which will get its own separate framework at some point down the line.
At the time of publication, there are still plenty of member states that haven't yet incorporated the directive into their domestic law. It's likely we'll still be waiting several months before we start seeing meaningful changes in how repairs are handled. Not to mention that this is a separate initiative from the removable battery laws — which will see the sale of a more repairable version of the Switch 2 — which are due to kick in next year.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Username on Monday August 03, @01:47PM (1 child)
>requires manufacturers to offer repairs for faulty products within a "reasonable time" and "at a reasonable price." Manufacturers will also need to publish repair manuals — for free — and offer clear pricing for spare parts.
This is only something a well established manufacturer can do. Is there a size requirement for the manufacturer? Or will the guy hacking charcoal grills together out of random stuff get sued out of existence by a large grill manufacturer that buys one of his grills?
(Score: 3, Informative) by VLM on Monday August 03, @06:17PM
https://commission.europa.eu/law/law-topic/consumer-protection-law/directive-repair-goods_en [europa.eu]
EU is a dictatorship not a republic, so if the voters don't vote for it, they're not free to not implement it on paper, but there are two side effects:
1) Any former nation can implement their own stricter rules, the dictators only set a floor.
2) Its possible to not enforce it, both by playing games in a national govt and at the mfgr level. The people will pay more, for more levels of middlemen and worse service.
The docs at the link above use the specific example of just not putting the pdf manual behind a paywall on a website as being perfectly adequate. I've bought plenty of electronic stuff from essentially one person companies. Not a big deal.
Also WRT grills there is a specific defined list of almost entirely appliance durable goods, not including a grill.
AnnexII was neutered down to not include most things people actually want to fix current problems like John Deere tractors, etc.
Its "big box household appliances" plus TVs/monitors but not desktops/laptops, plus vacuum cleaners, plus any small EV (scooter etc).
Basically it'll kill the market for tablets but there will be "EU special" laptops, EV scooters and Ebikes will be dead. Perhaps it'll be impossible to buy a carpet vacuum cleaner in the EU but you will be able to buy a carpet scrubber machine that doesn't actually work if you add water and it works find as a dry vacuum cleaner, but its a carpet scrubber...
I suspect you will see an explosive wave of products marketed as "meeting product safety and legal requirements." as that phrasing is a workaround to avoid the law.
A lot of the law is anti-big box store and anti-amazon. All you need to do to avoid the law and its high costs is just operate fly-by-night. I can create a storefront, import and sell you an unrepairable vacuum cleaner for a third the price of a Dyson that lasts as long as a Dyson, then close next year. Then my cousin can open a new store that I merely coincidentally happen to be CEO of. Then my grandma. The net effect will be worse experience for customers, which is probably the intended effect all along.
(Score: 1, Disagree) by DadaDoofy on Monday August 03, @03:24PM (13 children)
"Manufacturers will also need to publish repair manuals — for free —"
Right. Nothing is free. The cost of these "free" repair manuals will most certainly be passed on to the consumer in the form the product costing more. This causes each and every buyer of the product, including those whose products don't break, to have to subsidize the cost or repair manuals for all.
It sounds very European, but no, I'd much prefer to pay the manufacturer for the manual when the product breaks, instead of paying the manufacturer up front to produce and distributing a manual I may never need.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by HiThere on Monday August 03, @04:08PM (5 children)
If they can publish the manual as a web page, it's something they should already have, and "for free" has minimal cost. (Just use static html, and a hosting provider.)
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by DadaDoofy on Monday August 03, @05:31PM (4 children)
Manuals don't write themselves, regardless of how the are published.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bloodnok on Monday August 03, @06:18PM
True enough but if a manufacturer is prepared to repair a product themselves, they will need some sort of documentation. Internal training won't cut it because siloing expertise is a sure way of losing it.
And if they are not prepared to repair the product they don't deserve to be in business.
Where I come from the job isn't done until its properly documented.
__
The major
(Score: 4, Touché) by epitaxial on Monday August 03, @06:24PM (1 child)
Wow, that might take some interns an entire summer. How will these billion dollar corps ever make a profit?
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by DadaDoofy on Monday August 03, @06:53PM
By charging you more for the product. Lol
(Score: 3, Interesting) by VLM on Monday August 03, @06:33PM
I've skimmed the official EU site and AFAIK gemini or claude best effort seems good enough.
I was unsuccessful at finding a minimum spec for a repair manual. "Here's some CAD drawings" might suffice for a simple product. Some of these devices are very simple; although not all.
The dictators directive creates an anti-lemon law where the consumer can demand the mfgr or importer repair the device, not just replace or refund. And there's a one year warranty extension if they demand a repair that you don't get if you demand a replacement (or buy another with a refund). My point being that as a practical matter you can't sell something like a dishwasher in the EU without a strategy to repair, none of this aliexpress drop ship and wash your hands of it like in the USA. So if you're selling it in the EU you have to have a repair manual for your own techs to use or a contracted tech service to use; there is no option to "not write a manual". And once you write it, you have to give it away online.
I don't think the law would permit giving away a trash manual (gemini interpretation of the original cad drawings) while handing a "real" human written manual to the mfgr's or importer's field techs.
How this fits into trade secret laws is going to be interesting. This is intended for boring commodity products but sooner or later someone will innovate and this law will make things weird. Probably just end up not selling new stuff in the EU just stick to selling to the free world only.
Legal liability will be interesting for "dangerous" parts. AFAIK the manual does not have to be written for noobs. You need pages of product disclaimers in users manuals to not lick power terminals but AFAIK this is not a requirement for the repair manuals, however, they may end up liable anyway.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 03, @04:31PM (3 children)
So you are one of those, "I never read manuals", types. Interesting viewpoint to find on this website.
(Score: 2) by DadaDoofy on Monday August 03, @05:35PM (2 children)
Why would I need to read a repair manual if my product isn't broken?
(Score: 2) by epitaxial on Monday August 03, @07:11PM (1 child)
Because you might learn something?
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 03, @09:19PM
It's DadaDoofy.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Username on Monday August 03, @04:40PM
I think it should read, "it cannot be illegal for the user to buy, possess or distribute the repair manual." That way they cant sue people for sharing it online for DCMA violation or what not that apple does.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by isostatic on Monday August 03, @09:49PM (1 child)
So you are saying that the manufacturer has to produce the manual anyway, because somebody will buy it.
The incremental costs of distributing the manual are zero. Like literally zero -- just release it as public domain or creative commons or similar.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by anubi on Monday August 03, @10:45PM
They can just support these folks who specialize in manuals.
https://www.manualslib.com/ [manualslib.com]
I don't think anyone wants to foist unnecessary costs onto a business.
Just make the repair docs public and shareable. Post your originals on your site.
I am disappointed in HP. They used to post all their service packs ( mostly drivers ) online to support legacy products. I felt comfortable buying HP for that reason. They took them down. For a while, several Russian FTP sites continued to distribute copies. Those got taken down too.
Amazon can warehouse and do all the logistics. They are really good at that.
Personally, I would like to revoke copyright and patent when support is revoked . Wasn't patent and copyright intended to support ongoing business models anyway? Not as a punitive model to have government enforce no one else do anything.
As Grandpa used to say: "Either shit, or get off the pot!".
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 2, Interesting) by pTamok on Wednesday August 05, @07:06AM
I'm looking forward to seeing what happens with vacuum cleaners (currently excluded).
I bought a 'big name' brand vacuum-cleaner second-hand, and it worked fine for a good stint, until the hose fatigue failed. The spare part, available from the manufacturer cost more than half the price of a new vacuum cleaner: for a length of plastic hose, which is probably supplied to the manufacturer in reels of 10s of metres, if not 100s.
If I could find the correct specification, I could probably obtain it from a 3rd-party for a minimal amount of money. But of course, it is not specified.
I hope the directive ends up with things being (a) designed for repairability* and (b) third-party replacements for unique e.g. injection-moulded parts become easily available. I've had too many things fail where a weirdly shaped plastic doohickey breaks rendering an entire device effectively useless.
As for the vacuum cleaner, the motor windings had a lot of copper, the body was high density plastic equivalent to 100s of shopping bags, or 1000s of drinking straws, and for the failure a single, simple, plastic hose, was destined for landfill**. Talk about waste.
* Use screws, not single-use clip fasteners; make access easy so you don't need to undo 47 fasteners to replace a light-bulb; make controls that suffer the rigours of being used by humans without mechanical sensitivity easily replaceable, ditto with sensors, and displays.
**Where I live, there are laws about the export of electronic waste. You can't - to prevent the environmentally catastrophic 'recycling' of waste in economically under-developed countries. So electronics/electrics have to be recycled locally, except that it is too expensive to do so, leaving incineration or landfill. So landfill it is.