Packaging businesses across the UK and Ireland have just passed one of the most significant compliance deadlines in a generation, with large producers required to submit their July to December 2025 packaging data to regulators by 1 April 2026 and small producers filing their full annual 2025 data by the same date. For many organisations that submission will have been their most detailed and consequential regulatory interaction to date, and for some it will already be surfacing questions they were not anticipating, particularly around what their historic compliance position actually looks like when examined under the requirements of Packaging Extended Producer Responsibility (pEPR).

Understanding where those gaps typically sit, and whether your organisation can demonstrate that the right people have been prepared for what the regulation now requires, is the practical focus of this article.

What pEPR Requires and Who It Applies To

pEPR came into force on 1 January 2025, replacing the original Producer Responsibility Obligations (Packaging Waste) Regulations that had been in place since 1997, with its purpose being to shift the full cost of packaging recovery and recycling onto the businesses that place packaging into the market and to incentivise the use of materials that are more easily recycled through a system of variable fees. The scheme is administered by PackUK, with UK Packaging PRO formally appointed as the national Producer Responsibility Organisation from 1 April 2026, creating a more structured industry-led delivery model for the scheme going forward.

In broad terms, the regulations apply to two categories of UK-established business. Small producers, defined as those supplying or importing more than 25 tonnes of packaging with a turnover of at least £1 million, carry reporting obligations, while large producers, those with a turnover above £2 million supplying or importing more than 50 tonnes of packaging, carry both reporting and financial obligations.

One of the most common areas of misunderstanding across packaging and food manufacturing operations is the material scope of the regulation, with pEPR applying to any material used to hold, protect, handle, deliver or present goods. This includes corrugated, flexible films, rigid plastics, labels, cartons and any other format used across the supply chain, extending well beyond plastic packaging materials alone.

This confusion is understandable, given that the Plastic Packaging Tax, introduced in April 2022 under the Plastic Packaging Tax (General) Regulations 2022, applies only to plastic packaging containing less than 30% recycled content manufactured in or imported into the UK above 10 tonnes per year, making it a separate and more narrowly scoped obligation. For Packaging Technologists, Specifications staff, Artwork teams and Packaging Development Managers whose daily decisions span multiple materials and formats, the distinction matters, and the regulatory framework your organisation is working within is broader than the plastic conversation alone.

Fee obligations under pEPR are now modulated based on the recyclability of packaging, assessed using the Recyclability Assessment Methodology (RAM), and the financial consequences of that assessment are significant and escalating. PackUK has confirmed a three-year modulation framework applying multipliers of 1.2x, 1.6x and 2.0x over consecutive years from the 2026 to 2027 assessment year, with RAM Green-rated packaging attracting steadily decreasing fees and RAM Red-rated packaging facing progressively higher charges. Producers who failed to submit their 2025 H2 recyclability assessments face an additional consequence, with PackUK treating all unassessed packaging as Red- rated and applying the corresponding modulated disposal fee accordingly. For anyone involved in packaging development, material selection or specifications, these are now direct and quantifiable financial decisions, with the cost of getting the evidence wrong built into a three-year escalating structure.

The Historic Liability That pEPR Is Bringing to the Surface

The original producer responsibility regulations have been enforceable since 1997, with businesses handling more than 50 tonnes of packaging with a turnover above £2 million required to register as a packaging producer, meet recycling obligations and evidence compliance through the purchase of Packaging Recovery Notes (PRNs).

The Environment Agency, as regulator, can investigate potential breaches dating back to that point, and what makes this particularly significant now is the trigger mechanism. The act of engaging with pEPR for the first time, whether through submitting data, registering with a compliance scheme or working with UK Packaging PRO, has in a number of cases prompted the regulator to examine whether historic obligations under the original regulations were ever met.

For businesses that were unaware the original regulations applied, or that misunderstood the thresholds or material scope, this creates a serious retrospective exposure, given that breaches of the original regulations are criminal offences under UK law. The Environment Agency now typically pursues enforcement undertakings, monetary penalties or formal cautions rather than prosecution, but the financial and reputational consequences remain significant and the lookback period can stretch back across decades.

A further area of exposure involves group company structures, where the original regulations required group companies to aggregate their combined packaging volumes and annual turnovers to assess whether the thresholds were met. An acquisition that brought a group above the threshold at the point of completion may never have been assessed for its compliance implications at the time, and years later that gap can surface directly through pEPR engagement.

Where the Gaps Typically Live

The following scenarios are hypothetical, constructed from common patterns observed across packaging and food manufacturing operations to illustrate how compliance gaps develop in practice, and they do not describe any specific organisation or individual.

Illustrative Example 1 -- The First pEPR Submission

Consider a mid-sized corrugated packaging manufacturer preparing its first pEPR data return, and as the team works through the submission process it becomes apparent that the business has been above the original producer responsibility threshold since approximately 2016 (illustrative date, chosen to reflect a period of operation under the pre-pEPR regime, Producer Responsibility Obligations (Packaging Waste) Regulations 2007) but has never registered as a packaging producer or purchased PRNs.

There are no centralised training records showing that procurement, operations or technical teams were ever briefed on producer responsibility obligations, and while the relevant procedures exist in some form, nothing was documented or signed off in a way that demonstrates awareness reached the people responsible for implementing them. When the Environment Agency follows up on the submission, the business has no audit trail to present, and while the compliance gap was not deliberate, the absence of evidence makes the position difficult to defend.

Illustrative Example 2 -- The Acquisition That Changed the Threshold Position

Consider a flexible packaging group that acquires a smaller label manufacturer in 2021 (illustrative date, chosen to reflect a point of acquisition under the pre-pEPR regime where group aggregation rules applied under the 2007 Regulations), where at the point of acquisition nobody in the technical, compliance or finance function models the combined group threshold. The acquisition brings the combined packaging volumes and annual turnover above the original producer responsibility threshold, but this is never identified as a compliance trigger at the time.

Several years later, engaging with pEPR surfaces the gap, with HR and L&D holding no records of any compliance induction or training update following the acquisition, and operations teams at the acquired site carrying no documented evidence that procedures were updated, communicated or understood. The business is now managing a retrospective exposure that originated at the point of a routine commercial transaction.

Illustrative Example 3 -- The Material Scope Gap in a Development Team

Consider a food-contact packaging business with an otherwise strong compliance culture, where the team has met its Plastic Packaging Tax obligations diligently since 2022 (illustrative date reflecting the introduction of the Plastic Packaging Tax (General) Regulations 2022) and regards its regulatory position as well managed.

When pEPR reporting begins, the broader material scope creates a data gap that the business had not anticipated, with Packaging Technologists and Specifications staff having worked within a mental framework shaped largely by the plastic conversation. Artwork and development teams have never been formally briefed on the extended material definitions under pEPR, and there is no training record to show that the people making daily decisions about materials, formats and recyclability understood the full regulatory scope their decisions sit within, leaving a gap not in intent or process but in documented, evidenced awareness at the level of the people doing the work.

What Being Actually Prepared Looks Like

Regulatory knowledge at leadership or compliance function level is a starting point rather than a complete answer, and the scenarios above share a common thread in that the information existed somewhere in each organisation, with what was missing being the evidence that it had reached the right people, in a form they could act on, at the time it was needed.

For Technical and Quality teams, procedures and compliance briefings need to be version-controlled and evidenced, and where a specification or procedure changed in response to a regulatory update there needs to be a record of who was informed, when and through what mechanism, given that a BRCGS Packaging Materials audit will ask for that evidence, as will an Environment Agency inquiry.

Shift-level awareness of packaging handling classifications, material definitions and any procedural changes needs to be documented for Operations and CI teams, since inconsistency in how standards are applied across shifts or sites is both an operational and a compliance risk, and the absence of training records makes it impossible to demonstrate that the standard was communicated consistently.

Packaging Development, Specifications and Artwork teams occupy a position of growing regulatory significance under fee modulation, with the people making daily decisions about materials, formats and recyclability now needing to demonstrate that their working knowledge of the RAM framework is current. The audit question under the three-year escalating multiplier structure is not only whether the right material decision was made, but whether the person making it understood the cost and compliance consequences of the options available to them.

Training coverage for HR and L&D teams needs to extend beyond the obvious compliance roles, as the acquisition scenario above illustrates what can happen when a regulatory change or a structural business event creates new obligations that reach the Compliance Manager but do not make their way into induction content, refresher training or documented briefings for the wider team.

The ability to produce a complete and accurate evidence trail under time pressure is the operational test that matters most for Compliance and SHEQ teams, with fragmented records across spreadsheets, shared drives and paper sign-off sheets creating risk at precisely the moment when the stakes are highest. The Environment Agency lookback period means the question is not only whether you are compliant today, but whether you can evidence what was in place across previous years.

The Wider Regulatory Picture

pEPR sits within a regulatory landscape that continues to develop, and several near-term milestones carry direct implications for packaging operations planning their compliance and workforce readiness activity now.

From 1 August 2026, large producers must register and report their January to June 2026 packaging data, including mandatory Self-Managed Organisation Waste data for the first time, adding a further data collection and reporting obligation that will require documented preparation across technical, specifications and operations teams in advance of that date.

The UK Plastic Packaging Tax rate also increases in April 2026 under the existing legislative framework, adding a further financial dimension for producers of plastic packaging, while the Deposit Return Scheme remains confirmed for go-live in October 2027 across England, Northern Ireland and Scotland, with barcode compliance requirements that will begin affecting packaging specifications and development workflows well before that date arrives.

For businesses with operations or customers in EU markets, the EU Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation (PPWR), formally Regulation (EU) 2025/40, applies from August 2026, introducing recyclability standards, PFAS limits and labelling obligations alongside harmonised EPR schemes across EU member states. With up to 80% of existing packaging potentially requiring redesign to meet PPWR recyclability and minimisation goals, and packaging redesign typically requiring a minimum of two years to execute, the planning horizon for Packaging Development, Sustainability and EPR roles is already running short.

The Practical Question for Every Packaging Business

With the April 2026 reporting deadline now passed and the RAM modulation framework actively shaping fee liability for the 2026 to 2027 assessment year, packaging businesses across the UK and Ireland are at a point where the regulatory commitments of recent years are translating into tangible financial and evidential obligations.

The operational question for any business in this position is whether it can demonstrate, with retrievable evidence, that the right people understood their obligations at the relevant time, that training and briefings were delivered, that they were recorded, and that those records are accessible when required.

That question applies equally to the Technical Manager preparing for a BRCGS audit, the Packaging Development team whose material decisions now carry a direct and escalating fee consequence under the RAM multiplier structure, the HR Manager asked to evidence induction content following an acquisition, the Specifications Technologist whose work sits at the intersection of artwork approval and regulatory compliance, and the SHEQ lead managing an Environment Agency inquiry.

Nvolve works with packaging and food manufacturing businesses across the UK and Ireland to build and maintain the training, competency and audit evidence infrastructure that makes that question answerable. If your organisation is working through its pEPR readiness or reviewing what historic compliance evidence you hold, we would would be happy to discuss further with you in a call with our team.