Under the Recyclability Assessment Methodology (RAM), red-rated packaging costs more, and the surcharge grows every year to 2028-29. The fastest way to cut your EPR bill isn't disputing the fee, it's changing what earns a red rating in the first place. Here are nine specific, common changes worth checking against your own range.
1. Remove carbon black pigment from rigid plastic
Carbon black blocks the near-infrared detection used at sorting facilities, so it's an automatic red rating at the sortation stage, regardless of the plastic underneath. Switching to a lighter or NIR-detectable pigment can move a component straight to green.
2. Reduce label or sleeve coverage on rigid plastic
A label or sleeve in a different polymer covering more than 60% of a container's surface pushes it to amber at sortation. A smaller label, or a paper sleeve with clear removal guidance, can avoid this.
3. Avoid PVC, polystyrene, and expanded PE
These are red at the reprocessing stage for rigid plastic, regardless of anything else about the item. If any component uses them, a same-function alternative (PET, PP, HDPE) is usually available.
4. Use a label adhesive that releases in a standard hot wash
Rigid plastic components fail reprocessing if the label adhesive doesn't release during a 70 to 90°C wash. This is a specification question for your label supplier, worth confirming explicitly rather than assuming.
5. Avoid greaseproof, siliconised, or waxed paper and board
These coatings rate paper or board packaging red at collection. Uncoated or alternative barrier options can keep a paper component in the green band it would otherwise sit in.
6. Check plastic content in paper and board packaging
Paper or board with more than 5% plastic content by mass must be assessed under fibre-based composite rules instead, which cap out lower. Keeping plastic content under that threshold, where the format allows it, keeps the component in the more favourable paper and board assessment.
7. Arrange take-back scheme evidence for flexible plastic
Flexible plastic packaging, films, pouches, sachets, cannot be rated green under any circumstances, but it can move from red to amber with documented take-back scheme evidence. If you already use flexible formats, this is often the single fastest fee reduction available without a material change at all.
8. Limit direct printing on PET bottles and thermoforms
Direct printing on PET rigid packaging is red-rated unless it's limited to a batch code or expiry date. Using a label instead of direct printing for branding keeps the container eligible for green.
9. Chase missing supplier data before assuming
If you don't have evidence of a component's composition, it defaults to red, the same treatment as a genuinely unrecyclable material. For many producers, the cheapest saving available isn't a material change at all, it's getting accurate specifications from packaging suppliers so components aren't rated red purely for lack of paperwork.
See exactly which of your components are red, and what changing them would save, free for 14 days.
Start your free trialSource: RAM 2027 materials assessment guidance, GOV.UK, updated 2 July 2026.