PRODUCT QUALITY, DURABILITY & CONSUMER STANDARDS
POSITION
Products sold as new in the United States must work, perform their advertised functions, use materials suitable for their stated purpose, and meet a clear minimum quality standard. Consumers should be able to identify a product's verified quality, expected service life, repair support, and assembly demands before paying for it.
OUR PHILOSOPHY
A functioning market requires honest information and meaningful accountability. A product may be inexpensive and simple. It may not be unsafe, falsely represented, or disposable junk disguised as a properly functioning new product. Competition should reward businesses that make dependable products, not businesses that cut hidden corners and transfer the cost of failure to consumers.
NATIONAL CONSUMER PRODUCT QUALITY STANDARD
Every new consumer product offered for sale in the United States must satisfy a published standard applicable to its product category. When no category-specific standard exists, the product must satisfy a general federal Basic Duty standard. A product that cannot satisfy the Basic Duty standard may not be sold as new.
The applicable standard must verify that the product:
works for its stated purpose;
performs every materially advertised function;
is safe during reasonably foreseeable use;
is complete and reasonably capable of being assembled as advertised;
uses materials and components suitable for its stated loads, conditions, and ordinary use;
meets a published minimum service life measured in years, operating hours, cycles, loads, or another appropriate measurement; and
does not depend on an undisclosed subscription, accessory, repair, modification, or additional purchase to provide an advertised function.
VERIFIED QUALITY CLASSES
Basic Duty: Meets the minimum requirements for safe, functional, ordinary use. Its expected service life must be clearly disclosed.
Standard Duty: Meets higher published durability, service-life, repairability, and parts-availability requirements.
Heavy Duty: Meets verified higher loads, operating cycles, environmental conditions, durability, and long-term support requirements.
Manufacturers may not invent their own definitions for these classifications. Each classification must correspond to a published test. A product may not receive a classification solely because of its price, brand name, advertising, or unsupported manufacturer claim.
REQUIRED CONSUMER LABEL
The product, packaging, and online listing must clearly disclose:
its verified quality class;
its expected service life under ordinary use;
the applicable test standard and certification number;
its warranty period;
how long replacement parts will remain available and whether the product is reasonably repairable;
material, weight, load, operating, and environmental limits when relevant;
required assembly time, tools, skill level, anchoring, and number of people; and
the accountable United States manufacturer, importer, or responsible seller.
THIRTY-DAY PRODUCT APPROVAL
When government approval or certification is required, each product model or materially identical product line must receive a decision within 30 calendar days after the responsible agency receives a complete application and required testing materials.
Within five calendar days, the agency must identify any missing information. It may not repeatedly request minor information merely to restart or extend the deadline.
By day 30, the agency must:
approve the product;
approve it subject to specific corrective conditions; or
deny it through a detailed written decision identifying every failed standard, the supporting evidence, and the changes necessary for approval.
PRODUCT APPROVAL APPEALS
A manufacturer, importer, or responsible seller may appeal a denial to an independent reviewer who did not participate in the original decision. The appeal must be completed within 15 calendar days. The reviewer must affirm the denial, reverse it, or return the application with specific instructions for approval.
A missed deadline cannot leave an application unresolved indefinitely. A low-risk product may receive provisional approval after day 30, subject to inspection, suspension, and recall. A product involving a substantial risk of death or serious injury will not receive automatic approval, but the applicant must receive an expedited hearing and decision.
PREBUILT OR PROPERLY DESIGNED FOR ASSEMBLY
A product must either be delivered in a properly functioning prebuilt condition or be designed so an ordinary consumer with the disclosed skill level can assemble it safely and successfully.
All required components, fasteners, specialty tools, instructions, and safety information must be included unless a missing item was clearly disclosed before purchase.
Parts must align and fit within reasonable manufacturing tolerances without forced bending, unsafe modification, or undisclosed drilling or machining.
Instructions must accurately identify the parts, sequence, orientation, warnings, anchoring, tools, and number of people required.
The advertised assembly time must be a reasonable estimate for the disclosed consumer skill level.
UNIVERSAL THIRTY-DAY RETURN RIGHT
Consumers must have at least 30 calendar days after receiving a new consumer product to inspect, reasonably test, assemble when required, and return it.
Reasonable inspection, assembly, or testing does not eliminate the return right. A seller may not require unopened packaging when opening the package was reasonably necessary to inspect or test the product. Return conditions and any lawful exception must be clearly disclosed before purchase.
FIFTEEN-DAY REFUND DEADLINE
The seller must issue the refund within 15 calendar days after receiving the returned product. When the seller supplied the return label, the deadline begins when the carrier accepts and scans the return.
The refund must:
be returned to the original payment method unless the consumer chooses another method;
include the purchase price and applicable taxes;
include the original standard delivery charge when the product was defective, unsafe, incomplete, falsely advertised, improperly classified, or failed to meet its certified standard;
be provided as money rather than forced store credit; and
be issued without a restocking, inspection, processing, or return fee when the product was defective or failed to meet its advertised or certified standard.
The seller must pay return shipping for a defective, unsafe, falsely advertised, incomplete, or noncompliant product. For an ordinary change of mind, the consumer may be responsible for return shipping only if that condition was clearly disclosed before purchase.
Any limited exception for a perishable, personalized, hygiene-sensitive, or fully consumed product must be necessary, reasonable, and prominently disclosed before payment. An exception may never excuse a defective, dangerous, falsely advertised, or noncompliant product.
WARRANTIES, PARTS & REPAIR SUPPORT
A durable consumer product designed for repeated long-term use should carry a minimum two-year functional guarantee unless a longer period is advertised or required by its certified class.
For a product priced above $250, reasonably necessary replacement parts, service information, and diagnostic information should remain available for at least seven years unless a longer support period was advertised.
A consumer should receive a refund or replacement after one failed repair attempt for the same material defect or when the product remains unavailable for use for more than 14 cumulative days during the warranty period.
A seller must provide an available replacement part within five business days or provide a replacement product or refund when the missing part prevents safe assembly or ordinary use.
CONNECTED PRODUCTS, PHYSICAL DISCONNECT & OFFLINE CONTROL
A connected product should not require its owner to trust a manufacturer, cloud provider, utility, hacker, or remote third party forever. A consumer must have meaningful local control over a smart product that can observe private activity, collect sensitive data, control access, manage energy, move equipment, create heat or pressure, or otherwise affect physical safety or property.
A covered connected product includes a consumer device with an external network interface and a camera, microphone, location sensor, lock, alarm, motor, heating or cooling element, energy-control function, physical actuator, or another capability whose remote compromise could create a material privacy, property, or safety risk.
PHYSICAL EXTERNAL-COMMUNICATIONS CONTROL
A new covered connected product must include an accessible physical hardware control that disables its external network communications and remote-command capability.
The control must interrupt power, signal, or another necessary hardware path to the covered radio, wired interface, modem, or remote-command component.
A software setting, application button, voice command, touch-screen icon, account preference, or cloud command does not satisfy the requirement by itself.
Software, firmware, a manufacturer, a utility, a vendor, a government agency, or another remote party may not override or remotely reverse the physical state.
The product must provide a visible and locally verifiable indication tied to the actual hardware state.
A disabled connection must remain disabled through a restart, software update, account change, or loss and restoration of power unless the owner physically changes the control.
SAFE LOCAL FUNCTION
When external communication is physically disabled, the product's basic local function should continue wherever technically feasible. A light should still turn on, a thermostat should still control temperature, a lock should still lock and unlock locally, a camera should allow lawful local storage, and an appliance should still perform its ordinary local function when those functions can be provided safely without the internet.
A product whose core advertised function inherently requires a network must disclose that dependence prominently before purchase. It may not advertise ordinary local functionality that disappears when a subscription, cloud service, remote account, or manufacturer support ends.
SAFETY-CRITICAL PRODUCTS
A life-sustaining medical device, legally required emergency-communications device, fire-protection device, or other product for which full disconnection would create a greater immediate danger may use a certified physical safe-isolation control. That control must sever nonessential external access and remote actuation while preserving only the communications or protective functions independently shown to be necessary for safety.
The exception must be disclosed, narrowly designed, independently tested, and incapable of becoming a hidden general remote-control channel.
SECURITY SUPPORT & END-OF-LIFE DISCLOSURE
Before purchase, the label and online listing must disclose every external communication method, whether basic functions require a cloud service or subscription, the security-update period, and what happens when support ends.
A durable connected product must receive necessary security updates for at least the longer of five years after its last retail sale or its advertised service life, unless a longer category standard applies.
A security update may not secretly re-enable an interface, add undisclosed data collection, remove local control, or convert an advertised function into a paid subscription.
When support ends, the manufacturer must provide at least 180 days of clear notice and instructions for safe offline use, replacement, migration, repair, or lawful recycling.
A manufacturer must maintain a vulnerability-reporting process, authenticate updates, correct actively exploited critical vulnerabilities promptly, and disclose a material unresolved risk to affected owners.
CERTIFICATION & IMPLEMENTATION
Within 18 months of enactment, NIST, the Federal Trade Commission, the Consumer Product Safety Commission, and relevant sector regulators must publish risk-based design, testing, labeling, and safe-isolation standards.
A new covered product manufactured more than 24 months after the final standard may not be sold as new in the United States unless it complies.
A materially identical product line may use one verified certification rather than repeat testing for every unit.
An existing product is not subject to forced physical retrofit merely because a later standard was adopted. A manufacturer must still correct or recall an existing product when a proven defect creates a substantial safety risk under ordinary product-safety law.
Low-risk products may use simplified testing, but a manufacturer may not avoid the physical-control requirement by calling a material privacy or safety function low risk. Imported and domestically produced products must meet the same standard.
NO REMOTE OWNERSHIP OVERRIDE
The required control may not become a government, utility, manufacturer, or vendor kill switch. No product may contain an undisclosed universal credential, secret remote shutdown, or backdoor that defeats the owner's local hardware choice.
Core MPA standard: If a product can watch, listen, track, unlock, move, heat, cool, energize, shut down, or otherwise affect a person or property through a network, its owner deserves a real physical way to disconnect that network and keep safe local control.
FAIR IMPLEMENTATION
Standards must be specific to the product's purpose, risk, expected use, price category, materials, loads, operating cycles, and environment. A single rigid test should not be imposed on unrelated products.
Affordable products may offer fewer features or a shorter clearly disclosed service life. They may not be unsafe, falsely advertised, materially defective, or incapable of ordinary use.
The same requirements must apply to imported and domestically produced goods.
Low-risk products and small manufacturers may use simplified and affordable testing procedures, but no seller receives an exemption from safety, truthful labeling, minimum functionality, or accountability.
Standards and test methods must be public, measurable, developed through an open process, and subject to periodic review using failure, repair, warranty, complaint, and recall data.
ACCOUNTABILITY & SAFEGUARDS
The manufacturer, importer, and responsible seller must identify the party accountable in the United States for compliance, remedies, and recalls.
A false quality label, fabricated certification, concealed defect, or materially inaccurate service-life claim may result in stop-sale authority, mandatory refunds, replacement, repair, restitution, recall, and civil penalties scaled to sales, intent, repetition, and consumer harm.
Knowing certification fraud or intentional concealment of a serious safety hazard may be referred for criminal prosecution.
A business is not responsible for damage caused by proven abuse, unauthorized material alteration, an accident unrelated to a defect, or use contrary to a clear and reasonable safety instruction. Ordinary wear may reduce a remedy only when it actually caused the failure.
An intentional systemic violation by a for-profit business is also subject to the controlling Systemic Corporate Civil Penalty Standard in Corporate Crime & Executive Accountability. Product-specific refunds, repair, replacement, recall, restitution, stop-sale authority, civil penalties, and criminal referrals remain available and are not replaced by that standard.
Core MPA standard: A cheap product may be simple. It may not be junk. Before paying, consumers must know what verified standard the product meets, how long it should reasonably last, and who is accountable if it fails.
Related policies: Consumer Rights; Investigations, Enforcement Deadlines & Due Process; Trade, Tariffs & Fair Market Access; Cost of Living & Economic Security; Regulatory Reform & Administrative Due Process; Environment, Conservation & Natural Resources; National Cybersecurity Standards & Trusted Personnel.
Status: Proposed / Draft, not yet formally adopted.
Originally published: September 27, 2026.
Last updated: October 18, 2026.
Version: Draft 0.3.