Addressing a roundtable on digital issues in London on Friday, European Consumer Commissioner Meglena Kuneva said that while e-commerce is succeeding at national level, cross-border e-commerce is failing to keep pace. The European Commission believes that simpler and better-harmonised consumer laws will boost the sector.
The results of EU surveys among 26,000 consumers and 7,200 businesses were announced by Kuneva on Friday. They show that while a third of the EU's 490 million consumers have bought something online, only seven percent have bought from foreign suppliers. Of those with web access at home, 56% have bought online; but only 13% have made a cross-border purchase.
"These figures underline how much work we still have to do to boost confidence in the online internal market," said Kuneva.
The surveys, conducted this year, also suggest that fewer retailers are selling online. Fifty-one percent of EU retailers sell via the internet – down from 57% in 2006. Retailers said that only 17% of their e-commerce revenue stems from cross-border sales.
Kuneva said that the Commission is working to remove regulatory barriers to cross-border trade and is planning a new set of consumer contract laws.
"This Autumn, the Commission will bring forward proposals for a single framework consumer contract law for Europe's Internal Market," she said. "Currently, we have a jungle of complex laws which have evolved piecemeal over the last 20 years. The result in practice is a maze of different rights and practices, from cooling off periods to guarantees that are as unclear to consumers as they are confusing for business."
