Recycling partners

Processing companies

You may have already heard or read the terms ‘recycler’ and ‘dismantler’ in the context of the Swico Recycling system. Here are some explanations of what they do within the Swico Recycling system:

Recyclers

Recyclers are companies that are engaged by Swico as general contractors to dismantle, de-pollute, recycle and dispose of waste electronic equipment that is collected at Swico-certified collection points, at dealers with a take-back obligation, at the recycling yard and through individual collections. They may also operate collection points and/or take over the relevant logistics operations.

Requirements and criteria

Only companies that have successfully passed a paid audit conducted by the responsible Swico supervisory body and have a corresponding positive recommendation can be contracted as recyclers. Recyclers must also meet the following requirements before concluding the contract and during the contract period:

• All legally required permits are available; no ongoing procedures
• An in-house recycling rate of min. 40% for WEEE categories 3 and 4, excluding visual display units, is achieved within the company, including the affiliated dismantling companies
• An impeccable reputation, reliability as a business partner (including towards suppliers, employees, etc.)
• Financial stability (including as part of a corporate group) that allows necessary future investments to be made and current obligations to be met
• Transparent organisation and resilient management structures (responsibilities, deputies, own employees, etc.)
• Guaranteed compliance with Swico regulations, particularly with regard to the discharge of material to outside of the Swico system
• Removal of harmful substances must be carried out under the recycler’s area of responsibility. Secondary clients that have been audited by the Swico supervisory body that accept contaminated plastic groups and are approved for this special removal of pollutants are excluded from this role. 
• Complete and partially dismantled equipment (including without cables) may not be sold for further processing to third parties that are themselves not certified as recyclers by Swico. Complete equipment is considered to be equipment from which no parts or components have been removed. If only the cable has been removed, the equipment is still considered to be complete. If a part (e.g. monitor stand) or a component (e.g. mobile phone battery) is removed without the harmful substances being completely removed, the equipment is considered to be partially dismantled.
• Own capacities that enable processing of min. 1,500 tonnes per year or a desire to build up these capacities within two years, documented by activities.

Cooperation with Swico in the past (in the sense of a positive or negative rating) must also be taken into account when reviewing whether a contractual relationship should be renewed or extended.

Procedure with regard to concluding a contract

The Swico Recycling Board will check whether the requirements and criteria have been satisfied when processing the relevant applications, whereby an appropriate weighting must be given to each individual case. The Swico supervisory body shall inform the Swico Recycling Board of findings relevant to this assessment. However, a recycling company is not entitled to conclude a contract.

Maintenance of recycler status

Recyclers with an ongoing recycling contract are audited annually by the Swico supervisory bodies and submit an annual material flow report.

Dismantling companies

Dismantling companies are companies that carry out upstream processing steps on a recycler’s behalf. These include manual dismantling of the delivered goods and, if necessary, compacting of manually sorted pure groups for transport optimisation. Recyclers in the various collection areas typically cooperate with several dismantling companies and can thus reduce logistics costs and transport routes.

Dismantling companies have no contractual relationship with Swico and operate exclusively in Switzerland. Dismantling can be carried out by employees from the supplementary labour market (unemployment projects, penal system, residences for the disabled, etc.).

Dismantling companies are audited every two years in line with Swico regulations. The dismantling companies’ material flow data is integrated into the recycler’s material flow data.

Network

Swico Recycling is a member of  Swiss Recycling , the umbrella organisation of all Swiss recycling organisations that collect materials separately.

Swico Recycling is also a member of the  WEEE Forum , the European umbrella association of the take-back systems for waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE)

In addition, Swico Recycling is  EPEAT-certified . 

The EPEAT (Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool) was established by the US Environmental Protection Agency in conjunction with the IT industry and specifies a central product registration that allows buyers to quickly search for environmentally-compatible equipment. Furthermore, it promotes the review of equipment characteristics.