APA News

  • Hazardous batteries prosecution



    Testing undertaken by Minton Treharne & Davies, on behalf of the City and County of Swansea Trading Standards, found the harmful batteries on sale in a number of outlets of a major discount store chain. The BBC Wales consumers affair program ‘X-ray’ filmed a piece with Alastair Low (Public Analyst at MTD) to be shown in an article they are airing in 30th November. This should be available on the BBC i-player as well.

    A prosecution was taken by the Swansea Trading Standards utilising MTD’s analysis to demonstrate the dangerous nature of these batteries leading to a successful prosecution with the discount retailer Poundstretcher being fined more than £500,000 for selling tens of thousands of unsafe batteries with the potential to harm users.

    Poundstretcher had sold more than four million of the batteries, normally in packs of 20 for as little as 99p, in its stores and online since 2011.

    Test purchases were undertaken at a number of Poundstretcher stores with safety issues found for batteries sold under the brand names Hyundai and V2 Xtreme, imported from the Far East.

    More than 85,000 AA, AAA and other everyday batteries used in game consoles and TV remotes were seized from the firm in a nationwide probe.

    A court heard the “sub-standard batteries” leaked zinc salts and acid and could put people especially young children at risk of “very serious harm”.