Press Release: Consumers: EU-wide complaints-classifying system to speed up policy response to failing markets

On 7 July, 2009, the European Commission unveiled a blueprint for an EU-wide method for classifying and reporting consumer complaints, inviting public comments on the proposal. The number of consumer complaints is a key indicator of market health. About half of European consumers who are dissatisfied with how their original complaint was handled by a trader turn to a third party such as a consumer organisation or regulator for help. About 700 complaint-handling organisations exist in Europe, and most of them use their own classifications, which makes an overview very difficult, even at a national level. The idea behind today’s proposal was to ensure that organisations across the EU collecting consumer complaints can use a comparable classification method and then report their data to the Commission. The analysis of the EU-wide data will be a powerful way to help assess how different sectors and national markets are performing for consumers, and enable authorities at national and EU level to quickly and effectively target markets which are failing consumers. After collecting and analysing feedback from the consultation, the Commission will recommend the final version of the methodology. The complaints classification will be used by organisations on a voluntary basis.