What is the Omnibus Directive?
“The Omnibus Directive 2019/2161 is a European Union regulation passed in 2019 that sets new standards for consumer protection in the EU, directly affecting businesses that offer products and services online.”
Cyber Monday, Black Friday, Christmas campaigns… Amid the promotional season, brands and manufacturers have an additional task: to comply with the Omnibus Directive. While it is true that the objective of this directive is directly related to the protection of the end consumer, at SingularBrain we want to offer a more B2B approach.
What does it consist of?
The new directive requires, among other things, the lowest price at which catalog products have been sold in the last 30 days to be displayed. The aim is to allow the customer to check prices before the discount is offered and to regulate abuses in the management of promotions, such as fake discounts. To this end, when a discount is applied to a product, it must be applied to the last price in force during the 30 days before the start of the promotion. This way, the shopper can see both prices and the percentage reduction to check that the discount is genuine.
Omnibus aims to increase the protection and security of the shopper when making an online purchase, ensuring that promotional prices are adhered to and providing consumers with the necessary information to prevent fraud.
How can SingularBrain help you comply?
By doing what we do best – monitoring. One of our goals is undoubtedly to save our clients time. Again, we would take care of the analysis work to provide the necessary data on a plate (and never better said). In this case, we collect the daily price of all the products in the online shop, to have total control of the evolution and not to make any mistakes—a customized database at your fingertips.
Thanks to SingularPrice, you can keep track of your price history.
What happens if the rules are not respected?
The Omnibus Directive acts as a shield to protect consumers from misleading commercial practices and dishonest promotions. We have emphasized the transparency of promotions, but the scope is much wider, as it also aims to combat covert advertising (e.g. in influencer recommendations on social media), to correctly define the seller’s details, or to verify the authenticity of all reviews. Failure to comply with these measures will result in significant and unprecedented fines, especially for businesses that do not have an annual turnover (read more).
