The Consumer Centre UK provides advice and assistance to UK consumers that have made purchases with traders based outside of the UK.
We work closely with the European Consumer Centre Network (ECC-Net) which is a network of consumer centres based in the EU Member States, plus Iceland and Norway.
The Centres work together to provide advice to consumers all over Europe to empower them to enforce their consumer rights. We are not an enforcement body, so do not take action against companies, but often our advice leads to a resolution in the majority of cases that we handle.
We also work with other organisations worldwide to provide resolutions to consumer complaints wherever possible.
Our service is unique in that we advise only on cross-border consumer matters. And the best thing about our service is that it's free!
If you need some information or advice on an issue that relates to goods or services purchased outside of the UK, please get in touch with us: eccnet-uk@ec.europa.eu.
What Consumer Centre UK can do for you
Our mandate is to deliver free information, advice and assistance on cross-border shopping.
We can:
Advise you on consumer rights for shopping and travel under EU and national law;
Give practical tips to help you save money and avoid problems;
Help you with a complaint against a trader based outside of the UK for purchases made abroad – physically or online;
Engage with the trader in order to try to resolve the problem:
Advise you on further action if an amicable solution is not possible, such as out-of-court settlements, or other legal action;
Help you find a suitable organisation to handle your case if it needs to be taken further.
We cannot:
Force traders to act. We rely on persuasion which works in at least half of the cases;
Act as your legal representative;
Handle your complaint if one of the involved parties is based within the UK.
The most frequent issues the Consumer Centre UK deal with:
Online shopping, covering cooling-off periods, delivery times, and the requirement to provide clear information;
Buying goods and services, rights to repairs, replacements and refunds and the non-discrimination principle;
Air passenger rights related to cancellations, delays and related assistance, denial of boarding and lost or damaged luggage;
Package travel rights to information, to transfer a package to someone else, to a guaranteed price, and to choose an alternative package or a refund if the content changes;
Car rental problems such as unclear information on prices and costs of optional extras, and unfair contract terms;
Timeshares/holiday clubs, including the right to receive all relevant information before signing a contract, cooling-off periods and related payment rules.