Published: Wednesday 3 May 2023
Trading standards officers seized around 1,000 illegal vapes following a raid in a Notting Hill Gate shop.
Since 2022, the team has seized over 4,000 illegal vapes in Kensington and Chelsea, worth £30,000.
During the raid, the team found 27 travel adaptors deemed unsafe for use along with 9 pouches of oral tobacco and 62 packets of shisha tobacco. The team also discovered around 1,000 vape pens with a variety of tank sizes ranging from 5ml to 16ml with 3,000 and 7,000 puffs – over eight times the legal limit in the UK. Legal vapes would usually give 600 to 800 puffs and have a 2ml tank size.
The business selling these vapes will now be under investigation and appropriate formal action will be taken to ensure unsafe products are not sold by this trader in future.
Cllr Josh Rendall, lead member for local economy and employment, said:
“Illegal vapes are becoming prominent in shops around London with unscrupulous businesses selling non-compliant and oversized fake vapes. It is becoming a growing trend amongst young people who are unaware that they are buying fakes and the risks it carries with it.
This is a fantastic result for our trading standards team who have been working hard to remove these illegal and dangerous products from our streets and continue to educate retailers about the risks they pose. We encourage residents to report any concerns about any suspected illegal products to our trading standards team.”
To report any suspected illegal products, please email [email protected]
The trading standards team continue to educate consumers and retailers as some are not aware they are buying and selling illegal vapes. They will be conducting a series of test purchases in the borough over the coming months to ensure such vapes are not sold to anyone under the legal age of 18 and will continue to seize illegal vapes where identified from retailers.
The reasons for vapes being illegal include:
• Not being approved by the medicines and healthcare products regulator, the MHRA. Retailers have been found to sell vapes from brands that have not been approved despite containing the legal tank size, nicotine level and recommended puffs.
• Oversized tanks carrying over the legal 2ml tank size. A vape pen should provide no more than 600-800 puffs.
• Having too high a nicotine strength. The highest nicotine strength for vapes is 2 per cent. The nicotine liquid should not contain any additives or ingredients such as caffeine or taurine.
• Carrying the wrong health warning. All vape products containing nicotine should have the following health warning 'This product contains nicotine which is a highly addictive substance' covering 30 per cent of the front and back of the packet.