Trading standards professional

About the role

This occupation is found in local authorities, government departments and small and medium service and business compliance teams in the private sector such as manufacturing and retail. The occupation is found where there is a need for the organisation to comply with consumer protection legislation and regulatory requirements and/or where the organisation has a duty or responsibility for ensuring that businesses and/or individuals comply with those standards, specifications and/or legal requirements.

The occupation identifies and reduces detrimental consumer harm such as where organisations have made false or misleading claims about the environmental benefits of a product or service (so called “greenwashing”).

Trading standards professionals are typically office based, home based and work in organisations where goods and services are designed, produced, stored, distributed, promoted, and sold.

The broad purpose of the occupation is to help ensure safe, fair, and legal marketplaces, helping businesses succeed and protecting communities. They do this by safeguarding buyers of goods and services, and the public, against unfair practices in the marketplace. They can work autonomously to provide highly specialist legal and technical expertise, advice and guidance and direction delivering effective consumer protection. Trading standards professionals require legislative knowledge alongside enforcement and investigative skills to enable them to lead and manage inspections and interventions to ensure an organisation’s compliance with consumer protection legislation including any actions and improvements applied to meet legislation. They operate in both the public and private sector.

In the public sector they ensure consumers are protected, working with businesses, or taking formal action to ensure compliance with consumer protection and trading standards law. Examples include where an organisation advertises that their goods and services are environmentally friendly, but they are not, or selling a product that is unsafe.

In the private sector they ensure relevant law is implemented and complied with, and employees follow company direction, which creates a fair-trading environment.

Trading standards professionals advise businesses to prevent them from engaging in fraudulent and unfair practices to maintain fair and safe trading environments. They may also provide additional protection for the public which may be impacted by a product (or its production) even when they are not the direct purchaser or consumer of that product. They specialise in protecting consumers and/or advising businesses in one or more of the following areas: Animal Health, Fair Trading, Feed & Agriculture, Food Standards, Hallmarking, Intellectual Property, Petroleum & Explosives, Environmental Climate Change, Product Safety, Weights, and Measures.

Trading standards practitioners must be independently mobile and have use of a vehicle, as this role involves work at a variety of urban and rural locations.

The role requires an amount of handling and carrying of sensitive and confidential documents and lifting some equipment. There will be a requirement to work with internal and external partners and to act as a liaison officer between the service and other organisations.

In their daily work, an employee in this occupation interacts with a range of internal stakeholders including members of their own team, HR, IT Finance and Communications. They also interact with external stakeholders such as regulatory services in local and central government agencies, legal advisers, and other compliance experts providing interpretation of legislation.

Trading standards professionals develop effective communications and networks with partners, to promote their organisation’s activities. They exchange and share their organisation’s plans and objectives on consumer protection activities with the partnership and alert them of issues affecting businesses and the community.

An employee in this occupation will be responsible for developing and managing staff, legal compliance, safety compliance, quality, and risk management systems, managing auditing systems and implementing outcomes. They have autonomy, making judgements and take responsibility for their own work. They plan and develop actions which lead to substantial changes regarding service delivery or developments both internally and externally.

Trading standards professionals provide best practice, delivering high quality technical advice and knowledge for their organisation’s compliance and regulatory departments; and to other organisations which they regulate or audit to ensure compliance with the law and standards. They initiate and lead tasks and processes, taking responsibility for the work of others and the allocation of significant resources such as staff, equipment and budget for its projects and services. They support best practice and provide guidance to their organisation’s regulatory, business, consumer, and trading compliance functions. They sustain a fair and safe trading environment for customers, consumers, and businesses, through interpreting and enforcing a wide range of trading standards legislation. Where legally empowered, they can deliver expert advice to businesses.

Trading standards professionals investigate issues and complaints, undertaking reviews or audits, to determine appropriate outcomes and regulatory actions to be implemented. They provide input, guidance, recommendations, and support to their stakeholders for the continuous improvement in their strategies and policies. They monitor, adapt, and respond to changes in the business and legislation environment.

Typically Trading standards professionals work independently and in a team. They will have line management responsibility for junior officers e.g., Regulatory Compliance Officer and manage a budget in support of the work of their team. They require a commercial mindset to work within agreed budgets and available resources. They work without high levels of supervision, and usually report to senior stakeholders. They are responsible for technical decision making and ensure that all work is delivered within agreed timescales. Although this role will have some managerial responsibilities its main focus is the responsibility for technical and specialist areas.