National foreword

This British Standard is the UK implementation of EN 16139:2013, incorporating corrigendum July 2013. It supersedes BS EN 13761:2002 and BS EN 15373:2007, which are withdrawn.

BSI, as a member of CEN, is obliged to publish EN 16139 as a British Standard. However, attention is drawn to the fact that during the development of this European Standard, the UK voted against its approval as a European Standard.

The reason for this vote is due to concerns that the rolling resistance test defined in Clause Clause 4.4 does not simulate safety incidents experienced in the UK.

The UK participation in its preparation was entrusted by Technical Committee FW/0, Furniture, to Subcommittee FW/0/3, Office Furniture.

A list of organizations represented on this subcommittee can be obtained on request to its secretary.

This publication does not purport to include all the necessary provisions of a contract. Users are responsible for its correct application.

Compliance with a British Standard cannot confer immunity from legal obligations.

This British Standard was published under the authority of the Standards Policy and Strategy Committee on 30 April 2013.

This European Standard was approved by CEN on 12 January 2013.

CEN members are bound to comply with the CEN/CENELEC Internal Regulations which stipulate the conditions for giving this European Standard the status of a national standard without any alteration. Up-to-date lists and bibliographical references concerning such national standards may be obtained on application to the CEN-CENELEC Management Centre or to any CEN member.

This European Standard exists in three official versions (English, French, German). A version in any other language made by translation under the responsibility of a CEN member into its own language and notified to the CEN-CENELEC Management Centre has the same status as the official versions.

CEN members are the national standards bodies of Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey and United Kingdom.

Foreword

This document (EN 16139:2013) has been prepared by Technical Committee CEN/TC 207 “Furniture”, the secretariat of which is held by UNI.

This European Standard shall be given the status of a national standard, either by publication of an identical text or by endorsement, at the latest by September 2013, and conflicting national standards shall be withdrawn at the latest by September 2013.

Attention is drawn to the possibility that some of the elements of this document may be the subject of patent rights. CEN [and/or CENELEC] shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent rights.

This document supersedes EN 15373:2007 and EN 13761:2002.

According to the CEN/CENELEC Internal Regulations, the national standards organisations of the following countries are bound to implement this European Standard: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey and the United Kingdom.

Introduction

This European Standard has been developed as a merging project out of the following European Standards:

EN 15373:2007, Furniture – Strength, durability and safety – Requirements for non-domestic seating
EN 13761:2002, Office furniture – Visitors chairs

All requirements in EN 16139 are taken from these two standards, where the new test level 2 reflects test level 3 of EN 15373 and the new test level 1 reflects test level 2 of EN 15373 and the former EN 13761.

The correspondent test method standard for this document, EN 1728, was also under revision in the same time period. In order to avoid a further revision of EN 16139 for the alignment with EN 1728, this project was slowed down until the final draft of EN 1728 was available.

1 Scope

This European Standard specifies requirements for the safety, strength and durability of all types of non-domestic seating intended to be used by adults with a weight of not more than 110 kg, including office visitor chairs.

This European Standard does not apply to ranked seating, office work chairs, chairs for educational institutions, outdoor seating and to links for linked seating for which European Standards or drafts exist. It does also not apply to work chairs for industrial use.

This European Standard does not include requirements for the durability of upholstery materials, castors, reclining and tilting mechanisms and seat height adjustment mechanisms.

This European Standard does not include requirements for the resistance to ageing, degradation and flammability.

Annex A contains additional tests.

Annex B contains information on the level of test severity in relation to applications.

Annex C contains dimensional requirements for office visitor chairs.

2 Normative references

3 Terms and definitions

4 Safety

4.1 General

4.2 Shear and squeeze points

4.3 Stability

4.4 Rolling resistance of the unloaded chair

4.5 Safety of the construction

5 Safety, strength and durability requirements

6 Test methods

7 Information for use

8 Test report

Bibliography

BS EN 16139:2013

Furniture. Strength, durability and safety. Requirements for non-domestic seating

Published:

30 Apr 2013

Withdrawn:

29 Jul 2025