Illegal vapes seized in Aberdeen’s two shops

Trading standards officers in Aberdeen have seized more than 100 illegal vapes from two city shops.

The 104 single-use electronic cigarettes were seized because they did not comply with product safety law and could not be remanufactured to bring them into compliance. In addition, the manufacturer had clearly labelled these devices that were not to be sold in the UK.

The seized products named HQD and NORD were being sold at up to £12 each – with colourful packaging and flavours such as ice cream, blueberry, apple crush, and chocolate.

Under UK law, the safe legal standard set for the capacity of an e-cigarette tank is 2ml but many of those seized were more than double this, ranging from 5ml to 8.5ml.Products should also have the name and address of a UK contact. But many of the products were missing this information along with essential instructions for use, and health and safety warnings.

Graeme Paton, Aberdeen City Council trading standards manager, said: “Our trading standards team is working hard to get these illegal products removed from shop shelves, protecting the health and wellbeing of Aberdeen consumers, and making sure that retailers and wholesalers are only selling legal vaping products.

“We are seeing a worrying rise in complaints about shops selling vaping products to under 18s.

“We’d like to remind all shops selling vapes to check they can be sold in the UK, and for people using them to check the capacity for an e-cigarette tank and that if there are no statutory warnings or instructions, they should be aware these items will probably be illegal.”

Trading standards officers are advising parents to also be aware of disposable vapes which are fidget spinners which light up when they are spun and come in a range of flavours and colours. These devices lack information for their use and any storage instructions. They do not have any of the required health warnings that all disposable vapes must have. They have recently been found for sale in Edinburgh but are likely to also be on sale in Aberdeen.