Despite continuing threats by lawmakers to cut off funding, a federal product safety database has been launched online to give consumers a chance to review safety complaints about everyday items before making buying decisions.
The database, run by the Consumer Product Safety Commission, is available at SaferProducts.gov. As The New York Times reports, it is the result of legislation passed in 2008 following a wave of product safety scares, many involving children’s items made in China.
Consumers will be able to submit complaints for all types of products except food, drugs, cosmetics, cars and guns.
It will be early April, however, before the consumer complaints begin to be posted, and for the time being users will have to content themselves with the storehouse of recall notices. CPSC officials will review the consumer reports and then forward them to manufacturers before posting the complaints, a process officials estimate will take 15 business days.
Despite that review, the rules surrounding who can post to the database were the focus of much of the opposition from manufacturers and their Congressional allies. Because consumers will be able to lodge a complaint directly to the website, critics worry that frivolous accusations will overrun the database, and give consumers an unfairly negative impression of products.
“We just want it fixed,” said Rosario A. Palmieri, a vice president with the National Association of Manufacturers. “We want the information in the database to be accurate.”
Product safety advocates resisted the efforts to modify the database, which they call a major advance for consumers. “It’s incredibly important because consumers currently are in the dark when it comes to hazards posed by consumer products,” Rachel Weintraub, product safety director at the Consumer Federation of America, told the Times. “They either never find out or find out when it’s too late.”
One of the major Congressional opponents of the CPSC’s new website is Kansas Republican Mike Pompeo, who included an amendment in a February appropriations bill to defund the database.
“This is a .gov site,” Pompeo said. “This is a site where consumers would have a higher level of expectation about the data presented.”
The freshman Congressman has said he will continue trying to eliminate the funding for the website. Among the major business opponents of the database are the billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch, whose corporate political action committee provided the main financial backing for Pompeo’s November election.
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