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Decorative Lighting Strings
UL evaluates decorative lighting strings in accordance with the requirements described in the UL Standard for Seasonal and Holiday Decorative Lighting, UL / ANSI 588. The ANSI designation indicates that the American National Standards Institute approves the UL Standard as the American National Standard. Most retailers will only sell decorative lighting strings that have been evaluated to this standard. UL588 and the Two Strike ProgramIn order to help ensure that lighting strings are manufactured in accordance with UL's requirements, UL introduced a new Factory Surveillance program. Under this program, samples are selected from each active manufacturer twice a year for testing. Various aspects of the product are subjected to tests at UL including the wire, plastic material and lampholders. If UL finds a major failure, the product is placed on hold and the Applicant and manufacturer are issued a program nonconformance. This nonconformance is known as a Strike. The manufacturer is not permitted to apply the UL Mark until it can be shown that it has found the root cause of the failure, put into place the necessary corrective action, and samples submitted after they corrected the cause of the failure have been found by UL to comply with its requirements. In addition to UL's Factory Surveillance program, samples of lighting strings may be selected from the market place during the selling season for testing under the UL 588 Market Survey program. If there is a test failure under the program, the Applicant and manufacturer are issued a Strike. Two Strikes within a two-year period results in withdrawal of the Applicant and manufacturer and termination of its use of UL Listing Mark for Decorative Lighting Strings. UL's Decorative Light String - No Strike ListNo Strike List No. 1 - Consists of Applicants with manufacturers that have had samples selected during the Market Survey program and have not had a Strike under the UL 588 Two Strike Program for a minimum of three consecutive years. No Strike List No. 2 - Consists of Applicants with manufacturers that have not had a Strike under the UL 588 Two Strike Program for a minimum of three consecutive years but samples from this Applicant were not selected during the Market Survey program. The No Strike List will be updated a minimum of twice a year. To download a list of manufacturers on the Decorative Light String - No Strike List, click here. If you're a decorative light string manufacturer looking for more information on the No Strike Program please contact Anthony Tassone at +1-631-546-2943 or by email at Anthony.T.Tassone@us.ul.com. Applicant: The company or individual who applies to UL for the certification of a component, product or system. This party contractually assumes the financial responsibility for the cost of the product investigation and Follow-Up Service, and thereby exercises the rights to information obtained as a result of the investigation.
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Decorative lighting strings also referred to as holiday, seasonal, or Christmas lights, can carry potential safety risks when subjected to unforeseen consumer misuse or not manufactured in accordance with UL's safety requirements. The familiar UL Listing mark on a product means that UL engineers have evaluated and tested representative samples of the product for risk of fire, electric shock and other hazards and determined the samples conformance to UL's requirements. Indoor-use only light strings are marked with UL's green holographic label; indoor or outdoor-use light strings are marked with UL's red holographic label.