Nové povinnosti při poskytování finančních služeb

As we informed you in our recent post HERE, the Chamber of Deputies is currently discussing a government draft amendment to several laws that aims to introduce the possibility for consumers to withdraw from contracts concluded online via a special withdrawal button. The new obligation is expected to apply also to financial services concluded online with consumers, especially contracts for banking, credit, pension, or insurance services.

The draft amendment also provides exceptions where the obligation to make the withdrawal button available will not apply, particularly for contracts with a short insurance period (e.g., travel insurance or baggage insurance) or in situations where the contractual obligation was fully performed at the explicit request of the consumer before the right of withdrawal was exercised. These are situations in which the consumer should not be entitled to withdraw from the contract within the statutory withdrawal period following its conclusion.

The amendment contains other important changes for financial service providers concluding contracts online. The draft amendment aims to introduce a ban on the use of so-called “dark patterns” into the Consumer Protection Act. These are practices in the online interface that deceive, manipulate, or otherwise limit the consumer’s ability to make free and informed decisions, including manipulative highlighting of specific choices.

The draft amendment sets a fine of up to CZK 5 million for violation of this ban, which will be imposed by the Czech Trade Inspection Authority (ČOI).

The amendment also brings changes to the scope of the obligation of financial service providers to provide pre-contractual information to consumers. This regulation is designed as residual and will apply only to financial services not regulated by special sectoral legislation, such as the Consumer Credit Act or the Act on Investment Companies and Investment Funds.

In connection with the above, we therefore recommend verifying which category of financial services your activities fall into and updating the pre-contractual information provided to consumers before concluding the contract accordingly. At the same time, we recommend reviewing your general terms and conditions in light of the planned amendment. We will be happy to assist you with these activities.

Authors:

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Dušan Kmoch

Ondřej Pajatsch

Tomáš Černý