Only for the products that marketplace sells, and only while it genuinely ensures the obligations. Article L. 541-10-9-1 contains a real exception: the duty to appoint a representative is treated as satisfied for products where a person covered by article L. 541-10-9 established in France ensures compliance. That is a per-product, per-channel carve-out, not an exemption for your company. It does not issue you an IDU, it does not cover your own website, and it stops at the edge of that platform. In practice Amazon asks sellers for their own EPR identifier and deactivates listings that do not have one.Sources (2)
LégifranceLégifrance — article L. 541-10-9-1 of the Environmental Code (full text)
ADEMEADEME — which producers the EPR schemes cover
What the law actually gives you
The second paragraph of article L. 541-10-9-1 is the part worth reading closely:
« L'obligation de désignation d'un mandataire est réputée satisfaite pour les produits pour lesquels une personne physique ou morale mentionnée à l'article L. 541-10-9 établie en France assure le respect des obligations … »
Three limits are built into that sentence:
- « pour les produits » — it attaches to products, not to you. Products sold through that marketplace are covered; the same goods sold elsewhere are not.
- « établie en France » — the marketplace must itself be established in France. A platform operating from another member state does not trigger the exception.
- « assure le respect » — it must actually ensure compliance, not merely offer a service with EPR in the name.
Note also what the exception covers: the duty to appoint a representative. It is not a general release from being a producer.
Why marketplaces do this at all
Not as a favour. Since 2022 French law has made marketplaces liable for the EPR obligations of third-party sellers who have not met them themselves — the duty exists to stop platforms being a route around the regime. ADEME states it plainly: marketplaces are responsible for the EPR obligations of products sold by third parties, and that duty applies only where the seller has not already met its own obligations.
Read that last clause the right way round. The marketplace duty is a backstop protecting the French system and the platform, not a service designed to register you. It is why platforms ask you for your number: every seller who provides one is a seller the platform no longer carries.
Pay on Behalf, and what it actually was
Amazon's Pay on Behalf arrangement paid eco-contributions for sellers without a registration and recharged them. It was a stopgap for the money, and it never produced a registration: no eco-organisme membership in your name, no IDU, nothing to enter in Account Health, nothing usable on Cdiscount, ManoMano, Fnac or your own store.
That is why sellers who relied on it are now being asked for numbers they do not have. The fee was being paid; the registration never existed.
Where it leaves you, channel by channel
| Channel | Covered by the marketplace exception? |
|---|---|
| Products sold through a France-established marketplace that ensures the obligations | Yes, for those products |
| Your own website or Shopify store | No |
| A second marketplace that does not ensure the obligations | No |
| Wholesale or B2B sales you make directly | No |
| A marketplace not established in France | No — the article requires French establishment |
Most sellers are on more than one row. One uncovered channel is enough to make the representative duty live again for those products, which is why relying on the exception as a whole-company strategy tends not to survive contact with a second sales channel.
The practical test
If a platform or provider tells you it handles your French EPR, two questions settle it, and both have checkable answers:
- Which eco-organisme has been joined in my name, for which streams?
- What is my IDU, and can I see it in the public register?
ADEME publishes registered producers and their identifiers as open data, so this is verifiable rather than a matter of trust. If neither question has an answer, the products are covered only while that specific channel keeps covering them — and you have nothing to give the next marketplace that asks.
What a representative gives you instead is registration in your own name: your membership, your IDU, valid on every channel. See pricing for what that costs, and market data for what everyone else charges.
Frequently asked questions
Amazon has a French entity. Doesn't that satisfy the establishment condition?
The condition is about the person who ensures the obligations for those products, and it is judged per product and per channel. Even where it is met, it covers only the products that marketplace sells for you. Your other channels are unaffected, and Amazon still asks you for your own identifier.
If the marketplace covers it, why does Amazon ask for my EPR number?
Because the platform's duty is a backstop that applies only where the seller has not complied. A seller who provides a valid identifier is one the platform no longer has to carry. Asking you for the number is how it discharges its own liability.
We sell only on Amazon.fr and nowhere else. Do we still need our own registration?
Legally you may be within the exception for those products while it genuinely applies. Practically, Amazon asks for the identifier and deactivates listings without one, and the moment you add a second channel the exception stops covering you. Most sellers in that position register in their own name.
Does this exception exist for professional packaging too?
The article is drafted generally, across the French EPR streams, rather than for packaging alone. But marketplace sales to consumers are not the usual route for professional packaging — that stream is mostly direct B2B supply, where no marketplace stands between you and the end user.
Sources
- Légifrance — article L. 541-10-9-1 of the Environmental Code (full text)
- ADEME — which producers the EPR schemes cover
- Légifrance — Code de l'environnement
ADEME — open dataset « REP : producteurs, IDU » (SYDEREP)
Founder of EPR France Rep, the France-based EPR authorised representative for companies selling into France.
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