With the recent change in government – and a whole host of new and competing priorities – it seems a good time to ask how and when can we expect to see the consumer provisions of the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act come into force?

Although the Act is now law, having received Royal Assent back in May, it is important to remember that the different parts of the Act are designed to be brought into force through secondary legislation. So it won’t necessarily all happen at the same time and the first changes are likely to come into force in 2025.

From a consumer protection point of view, the most significant changes are set out in Part 4 of the Act:

• Chapter 1 includes the provisions designed to protect consumers from unfair commercial practices, and 
• Chapter 2 contains the new rules on subscription contracts.

Unfair commercial practices 

Chapter 1 of Part 4 essentially restates the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008, with some notable upgrades, including some tweaks designed to prevent drip pricing practices (where the price of a product or service increases through unavoidable costs added in the course of the purchase journey) as well as more specific and substantive rules designed to tackle fake reviews. 

The latter is a particular area of concern for regulators – only last week the BBC reported that businesses, especially restaurants, are being blackmailed by criminals who demand thousands of pounds, threatening to flood online listings with fake one-star reviews.

So when can we expect the new laws to take effect? Before the General Election, the previous government indicated that the Act would come generally into force towards the end of this year. The CMA recently said that it would be consulting on  new guidance on unfair commercial practices later this year so this is likely to delay things until next year.

Subscriptions

Chapter 2 of Part 4 includes a raft of new provisions governing subscription contracts. 

The position regarding these rules is more complicated, because despite the comprehensive (and quite complex) nature of these rules, there are large gaps that still need to be filled. 

In particular, we still do not know what will happen if a consumer uses and then cancels a subscription during the cooling-off period – what will they have to pay, if anything? This issue came up repeatedly during the House of Lords debate on the new legislation, with many concerns raised about the uncertainty for businesses operating online news and similar subscription services.

As a result of this, the previous government issued a statement assuring businesses that the new subscription provisions would be delayed until Spring 2026, to give businesses time to prepare – and to allow the government time to consult on certain aspects of the subscription rules, such as the position on refunds, and to bring in the required secondary legislation to clarify these issues.

There was talk of introducing a ‘use it and lose it’ rule, whereby consumers lose their right to a full refund if they use a product during the cooling off period. It remains to be seen whether this will work in a similar way to current laws, or if there will be a more granular approach. But one thing is for sure – there is quite a lot still to do in terms of the subscription rules and it will be interesting to see if the new Labour government sticks to the timeframe imposed by the previous one. 

It's important to note that many of the new rules on subscription contracts will require changes not only to a trader’s T&Cs, but also to the online consumer journey. For example, the new category of ‘key pre-contract information’ will need to be built into the sign-up journey, and there will need to be a mechanism for cancelling a subscription contract online. Practical solutions to these issues will require considerable thought and development time, so planning needs to start sooner rather than later. 

Enforcement

The CMA has also indicated that it will be consulting on its direct enforcement powers this summer.

We are currently helping a number of businesses navigate these issues, so please do get in touch if you need help!