Unfair commercial practices guidance
The Competition and Markets Authority's (CMA) purpose is to help people, businesses and the UK economy by protecting competition and tackling unfair behaviour.
About this consultation
We are consulting on draft guidance on the unfair commercial practices (UCP) provisions in the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers (DMCC) Act 2024. These provisions replace and update the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008.
The UCP provisions apply to a wide array of commercial practices with the potential to affect consumers, prohibiting:
- acting contrary to the requirements of professional diligence
- misleading actions
- misleading omissions
- aggressive practices
- the omission of material information from an invitation to purchase (which includes a prohibition of ‘drip pricing’ of mandatory charges)
- 32 commercial practices which are in all circumstances considered unfair (including a new banned practice in relation to fake consumer reviews)
- promoting unfair commercial practices in codes of conduct
The draft guidance illustrates how the UCP provisions may apply in practice and is intended to help traders to comply with them.
We want to hear from you
We would like to hear from anyone with an interest in the application of the UCP provisions. It may be of particular interest to businesses, their legal and other advisers, as well as to other enforcement authorities and consumer representative bodies.
Responding to our consultation
You can submit your response using the consultation form below.
You can either:
- upload a document (for example a PDF)
- send your feedback by email to consumerguidance@cma.gov.uk
If your response contains any information that you regard as sensitive and that you would not wish to be published, please provide a non-confidential version for publication on our website which omits that material and which explains why you regard it as sensitive at the same time.
If you need support with the form, or would like to send your response by email, contact consumerguidance@cma.gov.uk
Please note: you do not need to submit a response via email and the response form below.
Webinar: unfair commercial practices - exploring the provisions of the DMCC Act and the CMA's draft guidance
The CMA will be running a webinar on Thursday 9 January 2025, 11:00am to 1:00pm to:
- provide an overview of relevant changes to the law on unfair commercial practices and the structure and content of the CMA's draft UCP guidance
- provide an opportunity for Q&A and feedback on the contents of the draft guidance
For more information and to secure your place, please visit the event page.
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