Machinery Regulation 2027: Authorised Representative Limits
Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 narrows what an EU authorised representative can do for machinery, and Regulation (EU) 2019/1020 is what makes EU representation compulsory in the first place. The two are not the same thing.
Table of Contents
TL;DR
- From 20 January 2027, Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 replaces Directive 2006/42/EC. An EU authorised representative can no longer carry out conformity assessment, and can never draw up your technical documentation.
- An authorised representative is not mandatory. An EU-established economic operator is. Article 4 of Regulation (EU) 2019/1020 requires one; the authorised representative is only one of four ways to have one.
- If you already sell through an EU importer, you probably do not need an authorised representative at all.
- Directive 2006/42/EC required the name of an EU-established “person authorised to compile the technical file” on the declaration of conformity. That line does not exist in the Regulation.
- Machinery placed on the EU market before 20 January 2027 stays lawful, with no sell-off deadline.
In one sentence: under the EU Machinery Regulation (EU) 2023/1230, which applies from 20 January 2027, an EU authorised representative may hold your technical documentation and answer market surveillance authorities, but it cannot design your machine, draw up its technical file or carry out its conformity assessment — and a non-EU manufacturer only needs one where no EU importer, EU manufacturer entity or EU fulfilment service provider already acts as its economic operator under Article 4 of Regulation (EU) 2019/1020.
This article is about machinery under Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 and market surveillance under Regulation (EU) 2019/1020. It is not about the EC REP for medical devices under Regulation (EU) 2017/745, the GDPR Article 27 representative, the extended producer responsibility authorised representative for packaging and WEEE, the Swiss CH-REP, or an authorised representative under financial services law. Those are separate roles under separate instruments, and appointing one does not satisfy another.
All quotations below are taken from the Official Journal text as corrected by the corrigendum at OJ L 169, 4.7.2023, checked on 8 September 2026.
Is an EU authorised representative mandatory under the Machinery Regulation?
No. An authorised representative is not mandatory. An EU-established economic operator is. These are different things, and conflating them is a common error in published guidance on this topic.
Article 12(1) of Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 is permissive: “A manufacturer of a product within the scope of this Regulation may, by a written mandate, appoint an authorised representative.” Nothing in the Machinery Regulation compels you to appoint one.
The compulsion comes from elsewhere. Article 4(1) of Regulation (EU) 2019/1020 provides that a product covered by the acts listed in Article 4(5) “may be placed on the market only if there is an economic operator established in the Union who is responsible for the tasks set out in paragraph 3 in respect of that product.” Directive 2006/42/EC is in that Article 4(5) list. Recital 8 of the Machinery Regulation states the consequence in terms:
“Regulation (EU) 2019/1020 lays down the tasks of economic operators regarding products subject to certain Union harmonisation legislation. It also provides that such products are to be placed on the market only if there is an economic operator established in the Union who is responsible for those tasks. That Union harmonisation legislation includes Directive 2006/42/EC. As a result, products within the scope of this Regulation are to be placed on the market only if there is an economic operator established in the Union who is responsible for the tasks set out in Regulation (EU) 2019/1020 in respect of those products.”
Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 does not amend Article 4(5) to substitute its own number for the Directive’s. It does not need to: Article 51(2) provides that “references to the repealed Directive 2006/42/EC shall be construed as references to this Regulation and shall be read in accordance with the correlation table in Annex XII.” On that reading — which Recital 8 supports, though the Regulation does not spell it out — the obligation carries across the repeal by construction rather than by amendment.
Article 4(2) of Regulation (EU) 2019/1020 then lists who can be that operator: a manufacturer established in the Union; an importer, where the manufacturer is not established in the Union; an authorised representative with a written mandate; or, where none of those exists, a fulfilment service provider established in the Union. The authorised representative is one of four options, not the default.
So the practical answer for a non-EU machine builder is conditional. If your machines reach the EU through an EU importer, that importer is already the Article 4 operator and an authorised representative adds nothing legally required. If you sell direct — ex-works to an end user, or through your own webshop — and you have no EU establishment and no EU fulfilment service provider handling your products, an authorised representative is in practice the only workable option. Where an EU fulfilment service provider does handle them, Article 4(2)(d) makes that provider the Article 4 operator instead. For product lines outside machinery, the same Article 4 logic is walked through in our guide on whether you need an EU authorised representative.
What can an EU authorised representative not do under Regulation (EU) 2023/1230?
Three things, and the third is the one that changes on 20 January 2027.
1. It cannot draw up your technical documentation. Article 12(1), second subparagraph, is explicit: “The obligations laid down in Article 10(1) and Article 11(1) and the obligation to draw up the technical documentation set out in Annex IV shall not form part of the authorised representative’s mandate.” This is a prohibition on the scope of the mandate itself, not merely a default that can be contracted around.
2. It cannot take on the design and construction duty. Article 10(1) — ensuring machinery is designed and constructed in accordance with the essential health and safety requirements in Annex III — is excluded by the same sentence, as is Article 11(1) for partly completed machinery.
3. It cannot carry out the conformity assessment. This is the change. Under Directive 2006/42/EC, Article 12 repeatedly named “the manufacturer or his authorised representative” as the actor who applies the conformity assessment procedure. Under Regulation (EU) 2023/1230, Article 25 names only “the manufacturer or the natural or legal person referred to in Article 18” — that is, the manufacturer, or whoever carried out a substantial modification. The authorised representative has been removed from the conformity assessment provisions entirely.
| Task | Authorised representative |
|---|---|
| Design and construct to the Annex III requirements | No — excluded by Art. 12(1) |
| Draw up the Annex IV technical documentation | No — excluded by Art. 12(1) |
| Carry out the Article 25 conformity assessment | No — not named in Art. 25 |
| Engage a notified body for Annex I Part A machinery | No — that is the manufacturer’s procedure |
| Keep the technical documentation and EU declaration of conformity for 10 years | Yes — required by Art. 12(2)(a) |
| Answer a reasoned request from a national authority | Yes — required by Art. 12(2)(b) |
| Cooperate on action to eliminate risk | Yes — required by Art. 12(2)(c) |
| Anything else you write into the mandate, short of the three exclusions above | Yes — Art. 12(2) sets a floor, not a ceiling |
If a provider tells you it will “handle the CE side” of your machinery as your authorised representative, ask which of the rows above it means. Compiling a technical file for you is a legitimate service; it is simply not something an authorised representative mandate can cover. For what that file has to contain, see our guide to technical documentation for CE marking.
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What must the authorised representative mandate contain?
Article 12(2) sets a minimum. The mandate “shall allow the authorised representative to do at least the following”:
- Keep the technical documentation and the EU declaration of conformity — or, for partly completed machinery, the EU declaration of incorporation — at the disposal of national market surveillance authorities for at least 10 years after the product has been placed on the market.
- On reasoned request from a competent national authority, provide all information and documentation necessary to demonstrate conformity, in paper or digital format.
- Cooperate with competent national authorities, at their request, on any action taken to eliminate the risks presented by a product covered by the mandate.
“At least” matters. The mandate can go wider than these three; what it cannot do is fall below them, or reach into the three exclusions above. Article 24(3), for example, allows the notified body’s identification number to be affixed by the manufacturer or its authorised representative, acting under the notified body’s instructions.
Two practical consequences. First, the 10-year retention starts at placing on the market, not at the end of the contract, so a mandate that simply terminates leaves a gap someone has to fill. Second, the authorised representative has to actually hold the documents — not merely be able to ask you for them — because the obligation is to keep them at the disposal of authorities.
What changed from the Machinery Directive 2006/42/EC to Regulation (EU) 2023/1230?
| Topic | Directive 2006/42/EC | Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 |
|---|---|---|
| Appointing an AR | Optional (Art. 2(j) definition; no provision requires appointment) | Optional (express “may” in Art. 12(1)) |
| AR may apply the conformity assessment | Yes (Art. 12(1)–(4)) | No (Art. 25 names only the manufacturer or the Art. 18 person) |
| AR may draw up the technical file | Not expressly prohibited | Expressly excluded from the mandate (Art. 12(1)) |
| Minimum mandate contents | Not specified in the Directive | Three tasks specified (Art. 12(2)) |
| EU-established technical file compiler named on the declaration | Required (Annex II, 1.A, item 2) | Not required — no equivalent item in Annex V, Part A |
| Contact details on the product | Manufacturer’s business name and full address, and where applicable his authorised representative (Annex I, 1.7.3) | Manufacturer’s name, postal address and digital contact, indicating a single point of contact (Art. 10(6)) |
The fifth row is the one most likely to surprise you. Annex II, 1.A of the Directive required the EC declaration of conformity to state the “name and address of the person authorised to compile the technical file, who must be established in the Community.” Annex V, Part A of the Regulation has no such item. The declaration names the manufacturer and, where applicable, its authorised representative — and beyond the notified body at item 8, those are the only persons it must name.
This is worth stating carefully, because it is easy to over-read. The requirement to have an EU-established person did not disappear; it moved. It now sits in Article 4 of Regulation (EU) 2019/1020, as an economic-operator obligation, rather than as a field on a form. And note that in German-language guidance the phrase Bevollmächtigter für die technischen Unterlagen — sometimes rendered in English as “authorised representative for the Machinery Regulation” — refers to this technical-file compiler, not to the Article 12 economic operator. They are different roles and the English translation collides.
Whose name and address goes on the machine?
Two names, from two instruments.
Article 10(6) of Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 requires the manufacturer’s name, registered trade name or registered trade mark, and postal address plus a website, email address or other digital contact, on the machinery or, where that is not possible, on its packaging or in an accompanying document. The address “shall indicate a single point at which the manufacturer can be contacted.”
Article 4(4) of Regulation (EU) 2019/1020 separately requires the name, registered trade name or trade mark, and contact details including the postal address of the Article 4 economic operator “on the product or on its packaging, the parcel or an accompanying document.” If that operator is your importer, Article 13(3) of the Machinery Regulation imposes an equivalent marking duty on the importer directly.
So if you are a non-EU manufacturer using an authorised representative, both your details and your authorised representative’s details appear. If you are using an EU importer instead, both your details and the importer’s appear. The one exception is Article 17: an importer or distributor that places the machinery on the market under its own name or trademark becomes the manufacturer for the purposes of the Regulation, and takes the marking duty with it. Short of that, there is no arrangement under which the non-EU manufacturer’s own identity comes off the machine.
Do machines placed on the market before 20 January 2027 have to comply?
Article 52(1) of the Regulation provides that Member States “shall not impede the making available on the market of products which were placed on the market in conformity with Directive 2006/42/EC before 20 January 2027.”
There is no sell-off deadline. Unlike several other EU product regulations, Article 52(1) sets no outer date by which grandfathered stock must clear. What matters is placing on the market — defined in Article 3(12) as “the first making available” on the Union market — not subsequent sales down the chain. Article 52(2) adds that EC type-examination certificates and approval decisions issued under Article 12 of the Directive “shall remain valid until they expire.”
One qualification that is easy to miss. Article 52(1) does not leave grandfathered products entirely under the old regime: its second sentence provides that Chapter VI of the Regulation — the Union market surveillance and safeguard chapter — applies to them, mutatis mutandis, from 19 July 2023, in place of Article 11 of the Directive. Placing on the market before the cut-off protects the lawfulness of the product; it does not exempt it from the Regulation’s safeguard procedure.
One honest caveat: the Regulation is silent on whether an EC type-examination certificate can be renewed under the Directive after 20 January 2027, and silent on whether it can be used to support conformity under the Regulation. We have found no primary-source answer to either question, and would not assert one.
When does the Machinery Regulation apply: 14 or 20 January 2027?
If a source tells you the Machinery Regulation applies from 14 January 2027, it is reading the uncorrected text. The Regulation as first published in OJ L 165 of 29 June 2023 carried that date. The corrigendum at OJ L 169 of 4 July 2023 made fourteen date corrections across the instrument, including to Article 51(2), Article 52(1) and Article 54, moving the application date to 20 January 2027. Two other corrected dates matter here: penalties under Article 50(1) apply from 20 October 2026, and the notified bodies chapter, Articles 26 to 42, has applied since 20 January 2024.
What to check before 20 January 2027
- Identify your Article 4 economic operator. Not who you think it is — which legal person actually performs the Article 4(3) tasks and is named on the product under Article 4(4).
- Read your existing mandate. If it purports to delegate conformity assessment or the drawing up of the technical file, those clauses sit uneasily with Article 12(1) from January and are worth reviewing with your counsel. If you are appointing a new representative, our authorised representative selection checklist covers what to ask.
- Confirm where the technical documentation physically sits and who can produce it within the response time a market surveillance authority will expect.
- Check your Annex I classification. Six categories in Annex I, Part A now require a notified body with no self-assessment route at all — and no authorised representative can substitute for one.
- Redraw the nameplate. Manufacturer contact details under Article 10(6), economic operator details under Article 4(4).
- Rebuild the declaration of conformity to the Annex V, Part A structure. See our guide to the EU declaration of conformity.
What this article does not cover
It does not cover how to carry out a machinery conformity assessment, the Annex III essential health and safety requirements, functional safety architecture, the new cybersecurity requirements in Annex III section 1.1.9, or how to select a notified body. Those are engineering questions and they sit with your design team and a notified body, not with an authorised representative.
It also does not give legal advice. Where a specific supply chain is genuinely ambiguous — a group company that sometimes takes title and sometimes does not, say — that is a question for a lawyer, and we will say so rather than guess.
Related reading
- What is an EU Authorised Representative? Definition and role
- EU Authorised Representative: cost and how to appoint one
- Do I need an EU Authorised Representative? 2026 requirements
- Packaging EPR vs product safety authorised representative
- Our EU Authorised Representative service
- CE marking services
Regulatory references
- Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 on machinery, OJ L 165, 29.6.2023 — Articles 3, 4, 10, 11, 12, 13, 17, 18, 24, 25, 50, 51, 52, 54; Annexes I, IV, V.
- Corrigendum to Regulation (EU) 2023/1230, OJ L 169, 4.7.2023, p. 35.
- Regulation (EU) 2019/1020 on market surveillance and compliance of products, OJ L 169, 25.6.2019 — Article 4.
- Directive 2006/42/EC on machinery, OJ L 157, 9.6.2006 — Article 12, Annex I 1.7.3 and Annex II, 1.A (repealed with effect from 20 January 2027).
Frequently Asked Questions
Everything you need to know about EU compliance
No. An authorised representative is not mandatory. An EU-established economic operator is. Article 12 of Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 is permissive — a manufacturer may appoint an authorised representative — but Article 4 of Regulation (EU) 2019/1020 provides that machinery may be placed on the EU market only if there is an economic operator established in the Union responsible for the Article 4(3) tasks. Article 4(2) lists four who qualify: an EU-established manufacturer, an importer where the manufacturer is not EU-established, an authorised representative with a written mandate, or, where none of those exists, an EU-established fulfilment service provider. If you sell into the EU through an EU importer, you already have one and do not need an authorised representative. If you sell direct with no EU importer and no EU establishment, the remaining options are an authorised representative or, where an EU fulfilment service provider handles your products, that provider under Article 4(2)(d).
No. Under Regulation (EU) 2023/1230, Article 25 assigns the conformity assessment procedure to the manufacturer or to the person referred to in Article 18, meaning whoever carried out a substantial modification. The authorised representative is not named in that Article at all, unlike Article 12 of the repealed Directive 2006/42/EC, which named the manufacturer or his authorised representative throughout. An authorised representative can hold and produce your declaration of conformity, but it cannot perform the assessment that produces it.
No. Article 12(1) of Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 provides that the obligations laid down in Article 10(1) and Article 11(1), and the obligation to draw up the technical documentation set out in Annex IV, shall not form part of the authorised representative’s mandate. The authorised representative must keep the technical documentation at the disposal of market surveillance authorities for at least 10 years, and provide it on reasoned request, but it cannot author it. A consultant can help you compile a technical file; that is a separate engagement from an authorised representative mandate.
An EU importer does not need to become your authorised representative, because Article 4(2)(b) of Regulation (EU) 2019/1020 already makes an importer a qualifying economic operator where the manufacturer is not established in the Union. A distributor is different: a distributor is not listed in Article 4(2), so a distributor only satisfies Article 4 if it is in fact acting as an importer, or if you give it a written authorised representative mandate. Note also that under Article 17 of Regulation (EU) 2023/1230, an importer or distributor that places machinery on the market under its own name or trademark, or modifies it so that compliance might be affected, becomes the manufacturer with the full obligations that carries.
Both the manufacturer’s and the Article 4 economic operator’s. Article 10(6) of Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 requires the manufacturer’s name, registered trade name or trade mark, postal address and a digital contact, with the address indicating a single point at which the manufacturer can be contacted, on the machinery or, where that is not possible, on the packaging or an accompanying document. Article 4(4) of Regulation (EU) 2019/1020 separately requires the name and contact details of the EU-established economic operator on the product, packaging, parcel or an accompanying document. Where that operator is your importer, Article 13(3) of the Machinery Regulation imposes the same marking duty on the importer directly.
It can, but only if the EU entity is genuinely the manufacturer or the importer of the machinery. Article 4(2)(a) of Regulation (EU) 2019/1020 recognises a manufacturer established in the Union, and Article 4(2)(b) recognises an importer where the manufacturer is not EU-established. A dormant branch, a representative office with no employees, or a sales entity that never takes title to the goods is unlikely to be either. What matters is which legal person actually performs the Article 4(3) tasks and is named on the product under Article 4(4), not whether the group has an EU address.
No. Article 52(1) of Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 provides that Member States shall not impede the making available on the market of products which were placed on the market in conformity with Directive 2006/42/EC before 20 January 2027. There is no sell-off deadline: stock first placed on the EU market before that date can continue to move down the supply chain. The cut-off applies to the first act of placing on the market, not to subsequent sales. Two qualifications: Article 52(2) provides that EC type-examination certificates and approval decisions issued under Article 12 of the Directive remain valid until they expire, and the second sentence of Article 52(1) applies Chapter VI of the Regulation, the market surveillance and safeguard chapter, to those grandfathered products from 19 July 2023.
No. The EC REP under Regulation (EU) 2017/745 on medical devices is a different role under a different instrument. Its obligations include verifying under Article 11(3)(a) that the EU declaration of conformity and technical documentation have been drawn up, and under Article 11(5) it can be jointly and severally liable with the manufacturer for defective devices where the manufacturer has failed its own obligations. The machinery authorised representative is governed by Article 12 of Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 and Article 4 of Regulation (EU) 2019/1020, and its mandate is narrower. It is also distinct from a GDPR Article 27 representative, an extended producer responsibility authorised representative for packaging or WEEE, a Swiss CH-REP, and an authorised representative under financial services law. Appointing one does not satisfy the others.
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