About Weights and Measures Program

Ensuring accurate weights and measures are among the oldest government functions. It is specifically mentioned in the United States Constitution. The global and United States economies depend on uniform standards of mass, volume and length.  Thus, the Weights and Measures program serves a very important role in consumer protection and in facilitating trade.

Weights and Measures inspectors test all kinds of commercial weighing and measuring devices. They test scales used in grocery stores, grain elevators, livestock sale barns, pawn shops and other locations.  They test gas pumps and meters used to sell chemicals or to sell bulk fuel to farmers. They check packages containing edible and inedible products to ensure that the consumer receives the quantity stated on the label, and they even verify that scanners scan the correct price. Essentially, all consumer goods are subject, in one way or another, to the weights and measures law.

Metrology

The metrology function provides traceability services, both internally and externally.  In addition to certifying the mass and volume standards for our own inspectors, the metrology function provides certification for service companies and industry.

Each year, the metrology program certifies approximately 11,000 standards.  These standards include weights, test measures and volume provers.  The certification provides traceability of those standards to those at the National Institute of Standards and Technology.  Most of these standards are used to calibrate weighing and measuring devices, but a small portion are used by local industry in their quality control programs.

The metrology program participates in round-robin tests of standards and regional metrology meetings to ensure that results from our laboratory are consistent with other metrology laboratories throughout the world.  Because of the strict guidelines the metrology laboratories follow, one can be confident that a pound in New York is the same as a pound in Topeka and is the same as a pound in Los Angeles.

Serivice Companies

Kansas requires every commercial weighing or measuring device, excluding gas pumps and vehicle tank meters, to be tested by a licensed service company each year.  The Weights and Measures program licenses service companies and their technicians, authorizing them to repair, install and certify commercial weighing and measuring devices.  Kansas used to be the only state that allowed its service technicians to actually certify commercial weighing and measuring devices.  Now several states are moving in that direction for financial reasons.

The Weights and Measures program provides oversight to these service companies and service technicians.  Computer-generated lists of scales recently tested by service companies are provided to inspectors of large and small scales.  The inspectors retest the devices and compare results to ensure that the devices were properly tested.  If we find that a commercial scale hasn’t been properly tested by a service company, the scale must be retested and the service company may be fined.

Small Scales

Compared to some other states, the number of devices tested by the Weights and Measures program is lower, but our compliance rate for accuracy tends to be higher.  The goal of any weights and measures program should not be the number of devices tested, but ensuring devices are accurate.  In fiscal year 2010, small scale testing will be down due to layoffs and state general fund budget reductions that have left the program with only two inspectors to cover the state instead of six.

During the last fiscal year, the Weights and Measures program found that 82 percent of small scales in the state were accurate, down 6 percent due to increased emphasis of new installations.  The compliance rate for large scales is lower, 75 percent, because of climate effects on equipment.  The number of large scales tested fell in fiscal year 2009 because of budget cuts.

Unlike small scales, which are used in a controlled environment, vehicle-tank meters and liquefied petroleum meters are used on the backs of trucks.  They are subject to harsh environmental conditions (rain, snow, ice, heat, dust, vibration, etc.) and are harder to maintain in an accurate condition.  In 2009, the accuracy rate was 85 percent for 972 tests for vehicle tank meters. The program doesn't test propane meters due to a lack of state general funding.

Price Verification

Weights and measures inspectors also conduct price verification inspections at facilities using scanners. The compliance rate for inspected facilities was 62 percent in fiscal year 2009, 4 percent higher than the year before.  Noncompliance includes stores that undercharged as well as those that overcharged.  Typically the number of items for which stores undercharge is slightly higher than those for which they overcharge. In fiscal year 2009, overcharges outpaced undercharges by 3 percent.

Inspectors who conduct small scale and scanner inspections also verify the net content of consumer packages.

Packaging

Last fiscal year inspectors sampled lots containing more than 107,000 packages to ensure that they contained the correct net quantity. In other words, they made sure that the consumer was receiving the amount of product for which he or she had paid.  In an effort to use resources effectively, inspectors target packages they suspect do not contain the correct net quantity and do not inspect packages that have a high probability of passing inspection.  This is important to understand when looking at the compliance rate for packages.

Compliance rates declined to 62 percent, but this number can't be used to draw conclusions about all packages sold in the state.  Typically inspectors conduct audit inspections to screen packages and only inspect packages that are likely to be in violation.  Consequently, compliance rates apply only to those packages actually inspected.

Gas Pumps

The gas pump program tested more than 25,000 gas pumps last fiscal year to ensure that the consumer is getting all the fuel for which he or she has paid. This program has been very successful since changes were made to it in 1996.  Prior to 1996, service companies were responsible for the annual gas pump tests.  An increase in the petroleum inspection fee fund allowed the Weights and Measures program to assume responsibility for testing gas pumps.  While the compliance
rate for gas pumps in fiscal year 1997 was only 88 percent, it improved to 95 percent in fiscal year 2001. It has been at 96 percent since fiscal year 2006.

Gas pump inspectors randomly collect fuel samples to send to a private laboratory for analysis. Ninety-eight percent of the fuel samples this year passed the quality testing performed by the laboratory.

Equipment for a new program, wholesale meter testing, was acquired in fiscal year 2002 and put into service in fiscal year 2003. This year the program tested 420 wholesale meters used to sell gasoline and diesel fuel with a compliance rate of 95 percent.

The Weights and Measures program will continue to inspect weighing and measuring devices in an effort to protect consumers and to provide equity in the marketplace. However, budget cuts and layoffs will impede the large and small scale programs this fiscal year and into the future.