Customer protection

Get familiar with common terms, laws and organisations relating to customer rights:

• Competition and Markets Authority - a government agency that protects consumer interests, while ensuring that businesses are fair and competitive.
• Consumer Credit Act - contains provisions that can make credit providers jointly liable for any problems that arise with a purchase.
• Consumer - someone who is buying your goods and services but is not doing so for business purposes.
• Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations - protects consumers from unfair treatment by traders and places a general requirement on traders to act fairly and honestly. The regulations repealed most of the provisions of the Trade Descriptions Act.
• Customer - someone who is buying your goods and services. A customer may be a consumer or someone acting on behalf of a business.
• Financial Conduct Authority - a government agency that protects consumer interests while promoting healthy competition between financial services firms.
• Reasonable - The Consumer Rights Act states that what is reasonable "is a question of fact" not defined in law but generally taken to mean in comparison with another supplier as the Supply of Goods and Services Act (see below).
• The Consumer Rights Act - requires goods to be as described, fit for their purpose and of satisfactory quality. If they are not, the customer may be able to reject them.
• The Trading Standards Service - is part of the Department for the Economy and enforces consumer protection laws in Northern Ireland.
• Unfair Commercial Practices Directive - transposed into UK law by the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008 which protects consumers from unfair treatment by traders.