Underage sales of Vapes
By law you must be over 18 to buy vapes or e-cigarettes. Under proposed laws making their way through parliament, this age restriction will rise each year, making it increasingly difficult for young people to purchase these products. Furthermore, there will be new restrictions on flavours and packaging, and increased controls over the way such products are being displayed in shops. There are also plans to ban disposable vapes altogether.
Trading Standards carries out ongoing underage test purchasing operations to test the systems and procedures in shops to ensure they are effective in preventing the sale of these products to young people. We use Intelligence from the public to direct these activities.
Sale of Illegal Vapes
Trading Standards also carries out extensive enforcement in relation to the sale of illegal vapes. Often these are intended for sale in other countries and don’t comply with UK safety standards. Common issues we find are tank sizes that are illegal in the UK due to the quantities of liquid they contain and vapes that wrongly state they contain no nicotine.
In 2023 Trading Standards seized 20,000 illegal vapes in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough.
Cambridgeshire Stats to 30 September 2024:
Illegal vapes
| Complaints received | Businesses complained about | Businesses inspected | Vapes Seized | |
|
2020 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
|
2021 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
|
2022 |
1 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
|
2023 |
30 |
27 |
7 |
8,801 |
|
2024 |
28 |
17 |
14 |
8,429 |
Underage sales of vapes
|
Complaints received |
Businesses complained about |
Test purchases attempted |
Test purchase sales made |
|
|
2020 |
0 |
0 |
5 |
1 |
|
2021 |
4 |
2 |
0 |
0 |
|
2022 |
51 |
29 |
19 |
2 |
|
2023 |
45 |
33 |
15 |
2 |
|
2024 |
31 |
19 |
15 |
1 |
