Web Sweep Results

In the first two weeks of December the Office of Fair Trading OFT, in partnership with the Local Authority Trading Standards Services, carried out a “web sweep” of around 600 of the UK’s top retail websites to ensure they comply with key e-tailing laws.

• identified room for improvement in some areas, including the provision of adequate contact details, and transparency in cancellation and refund rights:
• 14 percent of sites appeared not to comply with regulations by providing no physical address or providing only a PO Box number
• 15 percent of sites appeared not to comply with the requirement to give shoppers information on their right to cancel within seven working days
• 31 percent of the sites appeared not to comply with the requirement to refund the full cost of the goods; of these, 56 percent excluded the cost of original delivery from refunds, and
• 40 percent of sites did not indicate that compulsory additional charges would be added when the price was first shown, but subsequently included such charges at checkout.