Consumer law | UK Regulatory Outlook July 2024

CMA publishes issues statement in its market investigation into veterinary services for household pets

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has published the issues statement for its market investigation into veterinary services, which it opened in May 2024 (see this Regulatory Outlook for background).

The issues statement sets out the regulator's initial theories on what might be affecting competition, potential remedies it may consider if it finds that there is an adverse effect on competition, and how it intends to approach the investigation, including the types of information and evidence it wants to gather. The statutory deadline for the investigation to conclude is 22 November 2025.

Parties are invited to submit comments on the issues and possible remedies by 30 July 2024.

CMA consults on draft consumer law compliance advice for trader recommendation platforms

Trader recommendation platforms are businesses that:

• operate a website or app that consumers may use to find a trader to carry out home improvement, maintenance, or repair work; and
• make representations that the traders listed or hosted on these sites are of a particular quality.

The purpose of the draft compliance advice is to help these businesses to understand and comply with their obligations under consumer protection law. It focuses on concerns identified by the CMA, including businesses making misleading claims about traders' performance, not vetting or verifying traders using their site or app, not operating effective complaints processes, failing to deal appropriately with and sanction problematic traders, and presenting consumer reviews in a misleading way or failing to take appropriate steps to remove fake reviews. The advice sets out key principles that businesses should follow to deal with these issues.

The advice notes that the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumer Act (DMCCA) is not yet applicable, but it appears to have been drafted with the new legislation in mind (for example, it notes that the DMCCA lists fake reviews as a commercial practice that is always considered unfair and that the new legislation adds new provisions on the collection, moderation, and publication of online consumer reviews). That said, the CMA will be publishing further guidance to explain the new DMCCA provisions, setting out what traders need to do to comply. To the extent that the new guidance conflicts with this guidance, traders will be expected to apply the new guidance. However, it is currently unclear if or when the new government will introduce the secondary legislation necessary to bring the DMCCA into full effect, meaning that it is also unclear when any new guidance will materialise.

The consultation requests feedback on the scope of the advice, the compliance principles it contains, the "dos and don'ts" examples, and some general and additional issues. The deadline for responses is 5pm on 16 August 2024.

CMA publishes response to consultation on marketing green heating and insulation products

The CMA has published its response, as well as a summary of the main comments made by stakeholders, to its consultation on draft consumer law compliance advice for businesses marketing green heating and insulation products, which it launched in December 2023 following an earlier call for views (see this Regulatory Outlook for background). The final version of the advice has also been published.

In its response, the CMA explains that it decided against extending the scope of the advice as suggested by some respondents because the intention is to cover consumer protection in the green heating and insulation sector specifically. That said, the CMA advises that the same general principles will be relevant to the marketing of other home heating products.

The CMA has amended the final advice following consultation to (among other things):

• make it clearer that it applies to marketing practices on any marketing channel;
• include specific references to blogs, advertorials and pay-per-click adverts;
• make it clearer that businesses are still responsible under consumer protection law where they use marketing material created by a third party, such as a manufacturer;
• make it clearer that the advice applies both to a business's direct marketing and to marketing that it provides to a third party, such as an installer, for use with consumers;
• cover situations where products are offered under a subscription service, making it clear that businesses must clearly and prominently explain these obligations alongside the headline price;
• give clearer guidance where part of the headline price genuinely cannot be calculated in advance;
• clarify that businesses do not need to include in their headline price the costs of products and services they do not provide, as long as they do not mislead people into thinking it is fully inclusive of other necessary products and services;
• clarify the circumstances in which it considers it is likely to be misleading to include the value of government funding in a headline price; and
• clarify that important qualifications must always be presented clearly and prominently in the marketing communication.

Since the CMA consulted on the draft compliance advice, the DMCCA has become law, but is yet to come into force. However, given that the DMCCA contains broadly similar prohibitions against unfair and misleading commercial practices as currently contained in the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008, the CMA does not expect that the DMCCA coming into force will have any impact on the substance of this advice.