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.