Behind the frosty glass: the EU’s Unfair Contract Terms Directive as a tool for justice in the modern financial sector
An EU directive about what is an unfair contract term is proving really helpful when it comes to protecting consumers in finance.
A law allowing consumer compensation that Portugal can be proud of
Imagine this: your telecom company charged you more than it ought to, or you bought a car and the company misled you and you suffered damages. Or your personal data was sold, without your knowledge or consent, to a third...
Successes and challenges of the French law allowing group actions
The French collective redress procedure, where consumers can go to court as a group, will soon enter its 5th year of operation. Time to have a look at what has been achieved (or not). It’s certainly food for thought in...
Ryanair strike: why passengers urgently need collective redress
It can be frustrating to be a passenger rights specialist nowadays. Even if at BEUC we don’t deal with consumer complaints, a task that our members fulfil, I still get a lot of questions from family/friends/colleagues asking for advice when...
Altroconsumo’s experience of collective redress
If the market is the carrot, then group actions are the stick. The creation of an EU-wide collective redress procedure is currently being hotly debated in Brussels. In Italy meanwhile, the Italian consumer group Altroconsumo has used this stick 14 times...
E-health: your every personal detail online
New technologies have flooded our lives: many day-to-day products and activities now begin with the prefixes i-, e-, cyber-, info-, techno-, m-, net-, tele-, and the list goes on. It’s easy to get lost in this carrousel of innovation! Digitalisation...
Collective redress for European consumers – yes, we can
I was sitting back in a train from Strasbourg to Brussels in early spring 1998. Looking at the landscape in a train often gives you the distance you need to analyse something happening in your life. I was a young...
Financial guidance: the missing tool!
When you’re sick, you go to see a doctor. They usually provide a medical diagnosis and a resulting course of action. It’s the same for legal situations, where you go see your lawyer or notary. But who do you consult...
Fuzzy maths or how the Commission solves ‘costly’ chemicals laws
The European Commission is running EU chemicals laws through its REFIT machine. REFIT sounds like a strenuous fitness regime for overweight risk managers, right!? It’s not. Instead, it is a Commission programme that looks to streamline EU laws – a...
A trans fat-free future
You’ve probably heard of saturated fats in butter, omega 3 in fish, healthy fats in olive oil. But have you ever heard of trans fatty acids (TFAs)? Also called ‘trans fats’ [1], they can hide in processed foods such as...