Kind of Epic,
Because of the job I do I can buy a laser of indeterminate power, there is no licensing or restrictions.
While I cannot walk into a shop and buy a 25Mw green pointer I can easily pick up the phone and order a 600 Watt tube without any questions.
There are no restrictions as such on pointers, the restrictions have been put in place on sellers rather than buyers.
In most cases if you can show "good reason" (from a legal point of view) we can buy pretty much anything.
A laser shipped to me as a 100 Mw "pointer" will get seized by customs, a laser shipped as "Industrial machine parts" won't. It's all down to end use, the UK restrictions are health and safety based, ergo we are told that above 5Mw is not suitable as a pointer but could be used as a designator for a high power laser machine.
On my machines there are 50 Mw greens that show where the (invisible) IR beam will strike when the machine starts, no problem at all buying those.
If I buy a "pointer" as a tool to use when aligning optics , again no problem.
Really strange laws we have here
best wishes
Dave