Online sellers face action on customer care

ONLINE marketplaces must have a “duty of care” to their customers when it comes to the sale of faulty electrical and consumer goods, a group of campaigners, charities and MPs have said.

In a letter sent to the Culture Secretary, the campaigners called on the Government to widen the scope of the proposed Online Harms Bill to include the sale of illegal or unsafe goods on the internet.

Carolyn Harris, the MP who is organising the campaign in her role as chairman of a parliamentary panel on electrical safety, said online marketplaces did not always have robust complaints procedures and that consumers were not always clear whether an item was being sold by an independent seller or the website itself.

The letter has been signed by MPs, including former Tory minister Sir Iain Duncan Smith, and organisations including the London Fire Brigade, Electrical Safety First and consumer group Which?.

Ms Harris said she had seen examples of electrical goods which created a fire risk being sold online. She said: “The Bill should look at all of these things and make it difficult, if not impossible, for firms to sell them. Many online firms are questionable in their duty of care.”

She pointed to the case of a constituent called Linda Merron who died in a fire in 2015, caused by a faulty air purifier she had purchased online for £90.

Lesley Rudd, chief executive of Electrical Safety First, said: “An unregulated system where profit can exist at the expense of consumer safety isn’t fit for purpose.”

Ms Harris said marketplaces needed to act swiftly to remove potentially dangerous goods when they are flagged and should make it easy for consumers to complain.

Some marketplaces already have processes in place designed to protect consumers.

Ebay said it takes “the issue of product safety and counterfeit goods extremely seriously” and works with regulators while going “above and beyond the legal requirements”.

An Amazon spokesman said that “safety is a top priority” and that it has “industry-leading tools to prevent unsafe or non-compliant products from being listed”.