Environmental Awareness

Our commitment and compliance to the relevant regulations that seek to protect and enhance our environment are established as fundamental parts of the business practices within Siemens Hearing Instruments Ltd. There are two main directives that will have a positive impact on the environment in terms of waste, that restrict not only what chemical substances are included within our products, but also that they are appropriately recycled or disposed of as part of their "end of life" cycle.

WEEE Directive

Under the recently introduced (Jan 2007) EU directive on Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE), producers of EEE who place product onto the UK market are obliged to identify equipment suitable for recycling and allow it to be separated from other waste streams. The "crossed out wheelie bin" symbol with a black bar beneath it denotes that the product falls within these WEEE directive guidelines and will always be found either on printed directly on the product or within the user instructions.

As a producer of WEEE, Siemens Hearing Instruments must support its market share proportion of the financial burden of the collection, treatment and recycling of EEE products, and so is legally required to register with a compliance scheme.

To this extent Siemens Hearing Instruments Ltd has joined the Transform WEEE Compliance Scheme and has been assigned the following Producer Registration Number (PRN): WEE/AC0065TW.

If you are a distributor/reseller of a product supplied by Siemens Hearing Instruments Ltd and wish to return it under the WEEE directive regulations, please contact us at the following e-mail address so that we can ascertain validity and arrange collection:csr.shi.uk@siemens.com.

RoHS Directive

The EU Directive on the Restriction of the Use of Certain Hazardous Substances (RoHS) limits the use of certain restricted substances within EEE and restricts their maximum concentration values. Substances such as lead, cadmium and mercury, to name a few, are now controlled under the RoHS directive.

Although medical devices such as hearing instruments are not included within the directive, it is the policy of Siemens Hearing Instruments and its parent company, Siemens Audiologische Technik GmBH, to employ the conditions laid out in the directive to ensure all products placed onto the market are compliant.

For further information on the environmental systems implemented by Siemens Hearing Instruments Ltd and/or issues relating to directives/regulatory affairs please contact csr.shi.uk@siemens.com.