The problem of consumer protection in Serbia is not so much a legal framework, but mechanisms that ensure its application in practice, according to an analysis signed by Nebojsa Lazarevic, a member of the Negotiating Team for Serbia’s EU accession negotiations and co-founder of the Center for European Policies (CEP). Marija Ciric, project assistant at CEP.
In addition to strengthening consumer organizations, one of the proposals for improving the current situation in terms of the application of consumer rights is the introduction of the institution of consumer ombudsman, ie. Consumer Protector.
It has been almost a decade since the European Parliament and the Council adopted the Consumer Rights Directive (Directive 2011/83 / EU).
This directive, proposed by the European Commission in 2008, has caused great controversy and has been the subject of extensive debate. Namely, the Commission found itself between two fires: on the one hand, the economic lobby, and on the other hand, the consumer lobby, and mostly the European Consumer Organization (BEUC).
The Commission wanted to unify the existing acquis communautaire in the field of consumer protection, which it had done so far through various directives, and called for full harmonization of Member States’ law with EU law in this area.
The aim was to make the acquis well-bound and to achieve an equal level of consumer protection across the Union.
Full compliance would prevent Member States from deviating from the standards set by the new directive and thus enable the strengthening of the single market, which would be of great benefit to European traders, who would be subject to the same rules across Europe.
On the other hand, the consumer lobby advocated mixed or “targeted” harmonization, ie. to introduce minimum standards to be applied by Member States, with the possibility of not lowering national standards if they already exceed those laid down in the Directive.
In other words, maximum harmonization could reduce the level of consumer protection in member states that were already implementing stricter rules than those set by the EU.
To the surprise of many, the Directive, once adopted, largely reflected the BEUC proposal.
The final product was a significantly shortened version of the Commission’s proposal, where only two (less significant) of the four directives at the time were fully harmonized and merged, while the two more significant ones were only slightly amended.
What is particularly interesting in this case is the fact that such a large umbrella organization consisting of 42 different interest groups (national consumer associations from 32 European countries) and representing the public interest has managed to overcome the more organized and, in the circles of European elites, more respected economic lobby.
In this sense, BEUC’s successful lobbying on the Consumer Rights Directive is a great achievement and a “victory” for European consumers.
The strength of this organization can be attributed to various factors, but what undoubtedly played a significant role is the funding that BEUC received through EU grants (1.3 million euros per year between 2008 and 2012).
Given the favorable financial situation, BEUC was able to carry out various activities and get involved in discussions on the Directive. Moreover, BEUC has managed to achieve the status of the most reputable and prominent consumer organization in the EU and as such influences the process “from within”, providing the Commission with credible information on this topic in order to create quality policy.
With the adoption of such a Directive, it has proved really possible that public rather than private interest prevails in decision-making at EU level. Unfortunately, it is almost impossible to imagine that in Serbia, an organization that represents the interests of consumers has such strength and exerts an equally significant influence on domestic decision makers. However, given the current position of Serbian consumers, such a scenario is much needed.
In Serbia, within the process of legal harmonization with the acquis communautaire, several laws have been passed to protect consumers.
They introduce consumer protection rules based on European legislation, but these rules are not always effective in practice.
The position of consumers in Serbia is not the most favorable, especially in terms of the real possibility to protect their rights in specific situations when their violations or restrictions in the actions of traders occur.
The most common problems that consumers face are related to the lack of willingness of traders to act on complaints about goods or services.
Unfair business practices and unfair contract terms are also common, as are breaches of the obligations of traders who are service providers of general economic importance.
When it comes to judicial protection of consumer rights, court proceedings are relatively long, legally unpredictable and expensive, and out-of-court dispute resolution is extremely rare.
Unlike the above-mentioned European example, due to the lack of adequate professional and technical resources, there is no strong enough consumer organization or coalition in Serbia that could provide legal assistance and support to consumers, although several of them stand out.
In addition, the existing model of financing these organizations from public funds is one of the most significant factors of stagnation in the expansion of consumer organizations, as it provides only a minimum of funds for the functioning of a limited number of organizations.
One of the potential financial sources for their work is the budget of local self-government units. However, although it should be in the interest of local self-government to provide thematically oriented support in the field of consumer protection, especially in relation to the provision of utility services, such support has been almost imperceptible in the past.
Local self-government units not only prescribe the conditions for the provision of communal services, but are also the founders and supervise the work of public communal companies, and it is in this area that a large number of consumer complaints appear, as well as forced collection procedures in communal cases. Hence the need for adequate legal assistance in terms of consumer rights at the local level.
Therefore, the problem of consumer protection in Serbia is not so much the legal framework, but the mechanisms that ensure its application in practice.
In addition to strengthening consumer organizations, one of the proposals for improving the current situation in terms of the application of consumer rights is the introduction of the institution of consumer ombudsman, ie. Consumer Protector.
The institution of the consumer ombudsman already exists in some EU member states, and these bodies can serve as models according to which a similar institution would be established in our country as well.
The consumer protector would fill the gap between addressing the trader and the court; he would respond to consumer complaints and give orders to retailers to rectify violations observed in their business practices.
Such a model could provide a higher degree of consumer protection in individual cases and thus contribute to solving one of the key problems in current practice. Of course, we should avoid a few classic pitfalls that have sometimes characterized similar bodies in Serbia in the last 20 years – the inability to sanction perceived irregularities, lack of authority to effectively investigate violations, budget constraints and dependence on the government…
And the opportunity to do all this is right now, in the first 100 days since the formation of the Government, Nova Ekonomija reports.
