Consumer Authority: web retailers must improve information provision to consumers

Following an inventory of 500 popular web retailers, the Netherlands Consumer Authority [Consumentenautoriteit] observed that many web retailers are careless in their information provision to consumers. In 90 percent of the web retailers investigated, the Consumer Authority observed one or more shortcomings in the information that web retailers are obliged to provide consumers with before entering into contracts with them. In 2006, the turnover achieved by Internet shops in the Netherlands was more than three billion euro.

Companies that trade via the Internet are subject to special rules in relation to information provision to consumers. For example, the Consumer Authority's inventory shows that more than 50 percent of the web retailers investigated do not inform consumers, or inform them incorrectly, of the existence of the statutory seven-day cooling off period (this is the time given to consumers to change their minds about an Internet purchase without having to give any reasons). Often, the period in which the product can be returned is not indicated correctly either. More than 55 percent of the web retailers wrongly attach certain conditions to product returns. For example, they stipulate that returns will only be accepted if products are returned in the original, unopened packaging. Of the websites investigated, 20 percent fail to meet the obligation to highlight the various steps that lead to the actual purchase. On 25 percent of the websites investigated, prices are indicated exclusiveof BTW (Dutch VAT) or it is unclear whether the price is inclusive or exclusive of BTW. Web retailers sometimes also fail to indicate the delivery period for a product (a little more than 20 percent).

Marije Hulshof from the Consumer Authority says: "When buying via the Internet, it is particularly important for consumers to be able to rely on the provision of proper and full information from the web retailers on products and on theway in which sales are concluded. That's why we did this inventory. Despite observing a lot of shortcomings in information provision, this does not mean that consumers should avoid buying via the Internet."

The Consumer Authority will approach all of the companies that it has found to be failing in their fulfilment of the information obligation or failing to do so sufficiently. It will do this gradually: the biggest web retailers with the most deficiencies first, and then the others. Marije Hulshof: "This is a young market that is very much in a state of flux. We trust that the companies we approach will meet their information obligation towards consumers. If they do not, there are other steps that we can take."