Fair Trading

The aim of fair trading is to ensure truthfulness of trade and prevent consumers being misled during contractual negotiations for goods and services. Such legislation includes the Enterprise Act 2002 and the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024. 

Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024

The Act paves the way to give consumers rights across the UK, with greater control and clarity over online purchases.

It does this by requiring businesses to provide clearer information to consumers before they enter a subscription contract, remind consumers that their free trial or low-cost trial is coming to an end, and ensure consumers can easily exit a contract.

Unavoidable hidden fees will also need to be included in the initial cost or clearly illustrated at the start of the purchasing journey. This will ensure consumers are clear from the offset about what they’re spending.

The Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act will also give new tools to the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) to address the challenges to competition in digital markets.

These tools will allow the competition regulator to set tailored ‘conduct requirements’ which require a powerful tech company to change the way it operates if it is not treating users fairly. These rules could give consumers the room to freely choose the services they use, or stop companies from withholding information consumers need to make good decisions.  

The Act also gives the regulator powers to intervene and direct a firm to change its behaviour to boost competition – whether that is to benefit people using smartphones or businesses dependent on cloud services.  

The Act will also give new powers to the CMA to closely monitor road fuel prices and report any sign of malpractice to the government.

Only a handful of the most powerful global technology companies will be subject to these new rules if, following an investigation, they are deemed to hold ‘strategic market status’.  

If companies fail to comply with decisions made by the CMA, they could be subject to fines reaching tens of billions of pounds. These fines and other measures will be balanced by rigorous checks and balances.

CMA published its approach to direct consumer protection,

The full document can be found at  https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-cmas-approach-to-direct-consumer-protection

The Approach

CMA plan to take to applying the new consumer protection regime under the DMCC Act in the first year. They will
• target clear infringements and conduct which is more harmful to consumers
• prioritise areas of essential spend for consumers
• carry out engagement and develop further accessible materials to help businesses
Early action will be focussed on more egregious practices where the law is clear, including:
• aggressive sales practices that prey on consumers in vulnerable positions;
• providing information to consumers that is objectively false (banned practices including those relating to fake reviews;
• fees that are hidden until late in the purchase process
• contract terms that are clearly imbalanced and unfair (including unfair exit charges)
Fake reviews
Guidance explains in more detail what is required. New provisions may require changes to systems. For the first 3 months, the focus will be on business support.
Drip pricing and section 230 of the DMCC Act:
Following consultation on guidance, CMA is taking a phased approach to the guidance.
In the Unfair Commercial Practices guidance, there is  a clear framework for complying with the parts of the law which are already clear and largely unchanged (e.g. The prohibition of unexpected and untrailed mandatory charges added on at the end of a purchasing journey).  CMA may take enforcement action on this type of drip pricing over the coming year.
However, for those aspects of the drip pricing guidance that have created more uncertainty (including fixed-term periodic contracts) there will be a further consultation and finalised guidance in the autumn. There will not be enforcement action on these aspects until after this.

Organic Claims for Foods

The Organic Products Regulations 2009 SI 2009 No 842. require that businesses must be certified by an approved UK organic control body if they produce, prepare, store, import, export or sell organic products in the UK.

They can only label products as ‘organic’, or use terms relating to organic production methods, if:

• it meets organic production rules
• at least 95% of the agricultural ingredients are organic
• all other ingredients, additives and processing aids are listed as permitted within the organic regulations
  the product,
• its labels and any suppliers are certified by an approved UK organic control body
  Contact your control body for guidance on organic production rules.

Other terms relating to organic methods include:

• ‘organically grown’
• ‘organically produced’
• ‘grown or produced using organic principles’
• ‘grown or produced using organic methods’

The rules also apply to company names or brand names. For example, you could not use the name ‘Smith’s Organic’ for a non-organic product or business. For further information on the requirements go to Gov.uk or Business Companion

Environmental Claims 

To access guidance on the legality of environmental claims go to the CMA 

Price Marking (Amendment) Order 2024. 

The Price Marking (Amendment) Order 2024. SI 2024, No. 1055. This Order amends the Price Marking Order 2004 (S.I. 2004/102), and comes into force on 1st October 2025.

Article 2(4) substitutes the text of paragraph 7(3) which sets out the requirements concerning the display of freight, delivery and postal charges.

Article 2(5) inserts a new article 7A, which provides that, where a trader offers a product at more than one selling price, for example a standard price and a different price for the members of a trader’s loyalty scheme, then the trader is required to show each selling price and unit price together with the conditions which need to be satisfied in order for the different prices to apply.

Article 2(6) amends article 9 to require that the reduced selling price and the reduced unit price must be displayed in the case of a general reduction.

Article 2(7) revokes article 14, which sets out provisions concerning units of quantity, and article 2(8) revokes Schedule 1 which set out relevant units of quantity for specified products for the purpose of the definition of “unit price”.

Article 2(9) substitutes paragraph 3 in Schedule 2, so that a trader is exempt from the requirement to show the unit price in certain cases where a product consists of an assortment of items where some of the items are sold according to weight and some according to volume or at different selling prices when sold outside the package.

Pricing Survey

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has now reviewed the way a range of grocery retailers displayed their prices in-store to assess whether they were clear, accurate and matched the price people were charged at the till.

The review looked at the price marking practices of 139 grocery stores in England and Wales, including supermarket chains, symbol convenience stores (small, independent retailers that operate under a symbol brand name), variety stores and independent food stores.

The CMA conducted on-site inspections and looked at a sample of products – such as fresh fruit and vegetables and products on promotion. During inspections at some stores, the CMA found examples where the retailer was displaying inaccurate prices or failed to display prices at all for certain products. Failing to provide clear and accurate pricing information for products on sale is a breach of consumer law.

Overall, the majority of issues were found at independent food stores and symbol convenience stores. The most common types of issues seen were missing prices, conflicting prices (instances where prices indicated on products conflicted with those shown on shelf edge labels) and prices not being displayed sufficiently close to products.

There were also issues with prices not being clearly legible, the selling price being obscured, and multibuy promotion labels that didn’t specify the price of the items individually.

The percentage of pricing errors found at each type of store were:

Supermarkets: 4.2%
Symbol convenience stores: 14.4%
Variety stores: 5.6%
Independent food stores: 7.8%
Overall, 60% of the errors resulted in a higher price being charged at the till. Further breakdowns by store type can be found in the report. For further detail go to CMA. To access a Poster (pdf 2.6 mb)

For more detailed guidance contained on the various legislative provisions go to the following links:

• Digital Markets Competition and Consumers Act 2024
• Pricing
• Ban on Excessive Charges for Use of Debit and Credit Cards
• Organic Claims
• Counterfeit Goods
• Hallmarking
• Essential Packaging Requirements
• Energy Labelling of Household Products
• Energy Performance Certificates
• Labelling of Textile Products
• Footwear Labelling
• Redress schemes for Letting Agents 

Copies of the legislation can be accessed through legislation.gov.uk.

Please note that this information has no legal force and is not an authoritative interpretation of the law, which is a matter for the Courts. It is intended to help business to understand in general terms, the main features of the legislation. The information is not a substitute for the legislation and you should refer to the text of the legislation for a full statement of legal requirements and obligations. Where appropriate, you should seek your own independent legal advice.

Newsletter

The Trading Standards service with the aim of providing updates on our work, produces a newsletter twice a year. To access a copy of our newsletter go to High Standard (pdf 1.2 mb). This newsletter is no longer in circulation.

Contact

Trading Standards service, Directorate of City Operations, Neighbourhoods and Regulatory Services, Civic Centre, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 8QH. Email: tradingstandards@newcastle.gov.uk