As safety agency is poised to launch database of complaints on consumer products, industry opposition mounts

In November, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission announced the agency would work to establish a consumer product safety information database.

A rule, which was passed by a 3 to 2 vote of the commission, set out how the agency will work with consumers and manufacturers or private labelers to process and post incident reports on the database.

Required by the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act of 2008, the database will allow consumers to go online to SaferProducts.gov and file a report telling the commission about an incident with an unsafe product or potentially hazardous consumer product.

Manufacturers and private labelers will have the opportunity to respond with comments and may request that their comments appear with the report in the database. The commission will make this information searchable online by the public.

The commission plans to launch the database in March as part of the SaferProducts.gov website.

However, an article in today’s Washington Post says major manufacturing and industry groups have raised concerns about the public database, saying it may be filled with fictitious criticisms about their brands. Competitors or others with political motives could post inaccurate claims, and the agency won’t be able to investigate most of the complaints, the article quotes business leaders as saying.

Commission Chairman Inez Tenenbaum and the other two Democrats on the commission voted for the database and called it a powerful tool for consumers, while the two Republicans members were opposed.

The database will offer information about defects that can cause injury or death but not complaints about reliability or quality. Only the 15,000 types of consumer goods regulated by the commission – which doesn’t include food, drugs, medical devices, cosmetics, tobacco, automobiles, or tires – will be included in the database.

Tuesday, the commission plans to offer an online preview of how the database will work.

The database has strong support from consumer groups, so, hopefully, it will be launched on schedule. Consumer groups say it will help be an early-warning system for problems beginning to crop up in the marketplace.