Brussels, 16/02/2016 (Agence Europe) - Belgium is currently the only member state that allows traders to use the new European dispute resolution (ODR) platform launched on Monday 15 February (this article complements our article published in EUROPE 11490).
The 2013/11/EU Directive and Regulation 524/2013 seek to set up a website that allows consumers and traders the opportunity to resolve, out of court, online trade disputes. Nonetheless, it is still up to member states to decide whether traders can also submit a complaint against consumers (B2C). If they decide to do so, they will only be obliged to inform the European Commission of the decision. The latter indicated that “Currently, we have only received notification from Belgium” in this connection but it did not rule out the possibility of receiving further notifications in this respect.
Further clarification regarding delayed implementation by 11 member states illustrate that currently five member states: Germany, Spain, Hungary, Luxembourg and Poland, have still not transposed the directive into their legislation, despite the deadline set for 9 July 2015. Six member states: France, Ireland, Italy, United Kingdom, Estonia and Latvia have adopted the legislation but are still registering the online dispute resolution bodies. Four member states: Lithuania, Malta, Romania and Slovenia have adopted the legislation but an evaluation of their online disputes bodies is still taking place. (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)