Consumer

🌐 follow Marie-Anne Frison-Roche on LinkedIn 🌐 subscribe to the Newsletter MAFR Regulation, Compliance, Law  - ► Full Reference: M.-A. Frison-Roche, "Pour un consommateur "vigilant" : l'éduquer. Analyse juridique" ("For a "vigilant" consumer: educate him. Legal analysis"), Newsletter MAFR – Law, Compliance, Regulation, 18 April 2023. - 📧Read by freely subscribing other news of the Newsletter MAFR – Law, Compliance, Regulation - 🔴For an efficient Compliance Law: an Ex Ante responsibility in alliance with consumer expectations  A survey confirms that consumers integrate the monumental goals that generate compliance duties and obligations on the companies that sell them products. But this does not create a duty on them to prefer these products over others: they do not feel "responsible" for them. Compliance Law is based on ex ante responsibility and shared duty. So, faced with this attitude, what can the Law do? - 📧read the article ⤵️ 

Full reference: Luguri, J. and Strahilevitz, L. J., Shining a Light on Dark Patterns, Journal of Legal Analysis, Vol. 13, Issue 1, 2021, 67p.  Sciences Po's students can read this article via Sciences Po's Drive in the folder MAFR – Regulation & Compliance. 

Full reference: Directive (EU) 2020/1828 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 25 November 2020 on representative actions for the protection of the collective interests of consumers and repealing Directive 2009/22/EC Read the directive

Full reference: CJEU, 1st chamber, 18th of November 2020, decision C‑519/19, Ryanair DAC vs DelayFix Read the decision   Summary of the decision This decision of the CJEU of 18th of November 2020 is about the jurisdiction clause for any dispute in air transport contracts, here those of Ryanair. This decision is especially interesting about the question to know whether the professional assignee (collection company) of a debt whose holder was a consumer may or may not avail itself of the consumer protection provisions, canceling the scope of this type of clause.  The Court takes back the criteria and the solution already used in 2019 about a credit contract: the protection applies by the criterion of the parties to the contract and not of the parties to the disputes. Such a clause is effective only if the integrality of the contract is transferred to the professional, and not only some of the stipulations. This Regulatory decision, through "private enforcement", incentivizes consumers to transfer their compensation claim (around 250 euros) to collection companies which, in turn, discipline airlines to stay on schedule.

Full reference: Frison-Roche, M.-A., From Competition Law to Compliance Law: example of French Competition Authority decision on central purchasing body in Mass Distribution, Newsletter MAFR – Law, Compliance, Regulation, 27th of October 2020 Read by freely subscribing the other news of the Newsletter MAFR – Law, Compliance     -   Summary of the news: Through its decision of 22nd of October 2020, the Autorité de la concurrence (French Competition Authority) accepted the commitments proposed by retail sector's firms Casino, Auchan, Metro and Schiever so that their agreement by which a common body centralizes purchases from numerous retailers, allowing each to offer these products under private label, is admissible with regard to competitive requirements.  In this particular case, the Authority had self-sized in July 2018, estimating that such a purchase center could harm competition, opening immediately a large consultation on the terms of the contract. In October 2018, the law Egalim permitted to the Authority to take temporary measures to suspend such a contract, what the Authority did from September.  The convention parties' firms committed on the one hand to update their contract limiting the power on suppliers, especially small and very small suppliers, excluding totally of the field of the contract some kind of products, especially food products and reducing the share of bought products volume dedicated to their transformation in distributor brand.  The Autorité de la concurrence accepts this proposal of commitments, congratulates itself of the protection of small suppliers operating like that and observe the similarity with the contract consisting in a purchase center between Carrefour and Tesco, which will be examined soon.  -   We can draw three lessons of this innovating decision, which could be a model for after:  1. The technique of Compliance Law permits to the Autorité de la concurrence to find a reasonable solution for the future.  Indeed, rather than punishing much later by a simple fine or to annihilate the performing mechanism of the purchase center, the Authority obtains contract modifications.  The contract is structured and the obtained modifications are also structural.  The commitments are an Ex Ante technique, imposed to operators, for the future, in an equilibrium between competition, operators and consumers protection and the efficacy of the coordination between powerful operators.  The nomination of a monitor permits to build the future of the sector, thanks to the Ex Ante nature of Compliance Law.  2. The retail sector finally regulated by Compliance technics. "Distribution law" always struggle to find its place, between Competition law and Contract Law, especially because we cannot consider it as a common "sector".  The Conseil constitutionnel (French constitutional court) refused a structural injunction power to the authority because it was contrary to business freedom and without any doubt ethics of business is not sufficient to the equilibrium of the sector. Through commitments given against a stop of pursuits relying on structuring contracts, it is by Compliance law that a Regulation law free of the condition of existence of a sector could leave. 3. The political nature of Compliance law in the retail sector As for digital space, which is not a sector, Compliance law can directly impose to actors imperatives that are strangers to them.  In the digital space, the care for fighting against Hate and for protecting private life; here the care for small and very small suppliers.    -   See in counterpoints the pursuit of a contentious procedure against Sony, whose the proposals of commitments, made after a public consultation, were not found satisfying. To go further, on the question of Compliance law permitting through indirect way the rewriting by the Conseil of a structuring contract (linking a platform created by the State to centralize health data with an American firm subsidy to manage them).

The liberal professions such as lawyers, doctors or accountants are organized into professional bodies and consider that they can not be reduced to mere companies operating in markets because the service they offer includes a human and moral dimension, translated by ethics, under the supervision of their internal professional organization, particularly through ex ante their power to adopt their own standards of behavior, and in ex post, the disciplinary power of their professional order. Competition law refutes this organization from the Old Regime and simply considers the "markets of legal or medical services, firms having to compete with each other and not having to organize the sector, by  or fixing Numerus clausus, etc. In the perspective of regulation, the liberal professions are, on the contrary, the ones most pertinento organize self-regulation in a globalized economy from the moment they give rise to a credible surveillance system and thus deserve the confidence of customers and public regulators.

Translated Summaries In The Journal of Regulation the summaries’ translation are done by the Editors and not by the authors ENGLISH Interchange fees set by the main credit/debit card associations play an important role in the retail banking sector, however they remain largely invisible to consumers.   FRENCH Les frais d’interchange fixés par les principales associations de cartes de crédit jouent un rôle important dans le secteur des services bancaires de détail, mais ils restent largement invisibles pour les consommateurs. SPANISH Tasas de intercambio establecidas por las asociaciones principales de tarjetas de crédito/débito juegan un rol importante en el sector de negocio de bancario minorista. No obstante, permanecen por la mayor parte invisibles a los consumidores. ITALIAN Le commissioni interscambio su carte di credito/debito fissate dalle principali associazioni giocano un ruolo importante nel settore dell’attività bancaria al dettaglio, tuttavia sono ancora poco visibili ai consumatori. ARABIC  رُسوم التبادُل التي وُضِعت مِن طرفِ جمعيات بطاقة الائتمان لها دورُ أساسي في مَجال المصرفية للخدمات الافرادية, لكِنَّ بقِيت هذِهِ الرُّسُوم غيرُ ظاهِرة لِكثِير المُستهلِكين.  ……………… Other translations forthcoming.  

ENGLISH Competition is the principle element of markets, in the princely sense of the term.The relationships that regulation maintains with competition are ambiguous. It is important to eliminate this ambiguity in order to reveal the ab initio opposition between regulation and competition, to shed light upon the dialectics between both of them. Indeed, regulation may aim at building competition, and is thereby presented as a tool that will cease being used when the competitive market functions effectively. Administration – Autorité de Régulation des Communications électroniques et des Postes – Competition – Competition Authority – Conflict of intersts – Consumer – Contract – Equilibrium – European Commission – Ex ante / Ex post – Government – Hayek – Horyzontal regulation – Information asymmetry – Liberalisation – Market failure – Natural economic monopoly – Online gambling – Political mandate – Postal services – Power – Principle – Real economy – “Réglementation” – Regulator – Regulatory Authority – Self regulation – symmetrical regulation – Telecommunication – Tool – Watchdog * * In The Journal of Regulation, these keywords are done by the Editor and not by the Author.   PORTUGUESE Artigo: Regulação versus Concorrência Concorrência é o principal elemento dos mercados, no mais genuíno sentido da palavra. As relações que regulação mantém com a concorrência são ambíguas. É importante eliminar essa ambiguidade de modo a relativizar a oposição ab initio entre regulação e concorrência, para trazer luz para a dialética entre elas. Com efeito, regulação pode tender a construir a concorrência, e é então apresentada como uma ferramenta que deixará de ser usada quando o mercado competitivo passar a funcionar realmente. Administração – Autorité de Régulation des Communications électroniques et des Postes – Concorrência – Autoridade de concorrência – Conflito de interesse – Consumidor – Contrato – Equilíbrio – Comissão Europeia – Ex ante / Ex post – Governo – Hayek – Regulação horizontal – Informação assimétrica – Liberalização – Falha de mercado – Monopólio econômico natural – Jogo em linha – Mandato político – Serviços postais – Poder – Princípio – Economia real – Regulamentação – Regulador – Autoridade de regulação – Auto-regulação – Regulação simétrica – Telecomunicações – Ferramenta – Observador* * No Journal of Regulation, as palavras-chave são fornecidas pelo Diretor, e não pelo Autor. ITALIAN Articolo: Regolazione vs. Concorrenza La concorrenza è il principio fondamentale dei mercati, nel senso stretto del termine. Le relazioni tra regolazione e concorrenza sono ambigue. Per rivelare il contrasto tra regolazione e concorrenza è importante cancellare questa ambiguità e chiarire la dinamica di questi due concetti. In effetti, la regolazione punta a sviluppare la concorrenza ed è spesso considerata uno strumento che non avrà più ragion d’essere una volta che il mercato funzionerà in libera concorrenza. Amministrazione – Asimmetria dell’informazione – Autoregolazione – Autorità di regolazione – Autorité de Régulation des Communications électroniques et des Postes – Autorità garante della concorrenza – Commissione Europea – Concorrenza – Conflitto di interessi – Contratto – Consumatore – Economia reale – Equilibrio – Ex ante / Ex post – Governo – Hayek – Liberalizzazione – Mancato Funzionamento del mercato – Monopolio economico naturale – Mandato politico – Potere – Principio – “Regolamentazione” – Regolatore – Regolazione orizzontale – Regolazione simmetrica – Servizi postali – Scommesse online – Strumento – Telecomunicazioni – Vigilanza * * In The Journal of Regulation, le parole chiave sono responsabilità dell’Editore e non dall’Autore.   SPANISH Artículo: Regulación versus la competencia La competencia es el elemento principal de los mercados, en precisamente el sentido de este término. Es importante eliminar esta ambigüedad para poder revelar la posición ab initio entre la regulación y la competencia, para poder traer a luz las dialécticas entre las dos. Así tanto, la regulación puede intentar construir la competencia, y es, por consiguiente, un instrumento que cesará de ser utilizado cuando el mercado competitivo funcione de manera eficaz.     Other translations forthcoming.