A motor, any electrical device in fact, has a rating characteristic of the general form shown by the orange curve:
The true continuous rating is where the curve becomes asymptotic to the horizontal, but designers can quite legitimately play many tunes with this in the context of the EAPC Regulations, depending upon what they are trying to achieve.
They can use one, high continuous rating, motor across all markets, to avoid having to procure oodles of different ones to meet national regulations, and use configurable controls packaged as part of the motor to artificially limit rating for some markets.
They can “shape” any limits in different ways, maybe applying a fixed cap on maximum output (cheap to implement but a bit frustrating for users), or a limit that takes advantage of the inherent capability of the motor for durations less than the specified test duration for “continuous” (which I think is half an hour).
They can use motors selected very tightly for specific markets, so maybe ones that really can only just about handle 250W for the specified test duration for the European market, because doing so might result in the motors being cheaper than the above approach.
They can (I’m fairly sure) decide what ambient conditions to rate for, which can make a huge difference.
Etc.
And, dodgy cheapskates can stick any old rating label on any old motor, and hope not to suffer any penalty for doing so!
