15 years of weee full-service – A guarantee system for old electronic appliances became an Europe-wide bestseller
Happy weee full-service Day!
In 2005, the WEEE guarantee system „Garantiesystem Altgeräte“ was founded, from which the „weee full-service“ emerged in 2010.
15 years later we take a look back. We interviewed Anja Olsok, managing director of Bitkom Servicegesellschaft mbH, who has been involved in building up the business from the very beginning.
What was different 15 years ago than today?
"We started with the first own guarantee system and a single service for Germany. Today, we can cover many more areas within the entire EU and have recently started to advise our customers on CE conformity. And our own business processes have also changed completely during this time: The first customers were still managed in file folders, but today we work 100% remotely and support our customers via state-of-the-art platforms and portals.“
What impact did the Corona pandemic have on your business?
"Despite everything, we got through the year well and can be satisfied with the results this year. We are happy to be able to maintain our business despite the physical distance to our customers.“
What has been the biggest challenge so far?
„We have grown quite a lot with our guarantee system for old equipment, so that at times we covered a guarantee sum of over 0.5 billion euros. Insuring such a volume, the reinsurer has to face major challenges when it comes to legal adjustments. We even had to coordinate the adjustments with the financial market in London. The whole thing was very time-consuming but in the end luckily everything worked out fine.“
What’s make the clients of the weee full-service so special?
"Our customer structure is a very colorful mix of different industries and countries. We have already seen many interesting products, for example a heatable outdoor jacket, a table dust extractor or a drinking bottle with an acoustic drinking reminder. We are very proud of each and every one of our approximately 3,500 customers, whether they are sole traders or global players."
Do you see yourself as an expert for electrical appliances?
„For the details we have a very experienced small team of experts who know the topics in depth. Of course, the expertise only comes over the years, because every customer is different and every country handles the WEEE directive differently. I never stop learning on the subject and the permanently changing legislation does the rest.“
If weee full-service could make a birthday wish, what would it be?
"That we achieve the collection rate of 65% for e-waste. And by "we" I mean Germany. Consumers have a large share of this, but so do companies that have to meet their product responsibility and ensure that their old appliances are disposed of in an environmentally friendly manner. Ultimately, environmental protection is something that concerns us all. That's why we have decided this year too to plant a company forest and make our own contribution to climate protection with 1,000 trees in the South Harz.“
