competition act 1998

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The CMA’s efforts include investigations into the package holiday and hand sanitizer industries.

By John D. Colahan and Anuj Ghai

CMA announces package holiday sector investigation

On 10 July, the CMA announced that it was investigating suspected breaches of consumer protection law in the package holiday sector. The investigation was launched on the back of work carried out by the CMA’s COVID-19 Taskforce. As noted in previous updates (see here), the Taskforce received a number of complaints about allegedly unfair practices concerning cancellations and refunds, including in relation to package holidays. The investigation specifically relates to concerns that businesses have not been respecting customers’ statutory rights to a refund for package holidays that were cancelled by either party due to lockdown restrictions. Notably, the CMA is carrying out the investigation under its consumer protection powers, rather than under competition law.

The investigation is being carried out under the CMA’s competition law powers rather than under its consumer protection functions.

By John D. Colahan and Anuj Ghai

On 18 June, the CMA released an update noting that it had launched an investigation under Chapter II of the Competition Act 1998 into suspected breaches of competition law by four pharmacies and convenience stores. In particular, the investigations relate to suspected charging of excessive and unfair prices for hand sanitiser products during the COVID-19 pandemic.

As noted in a prior blog post, the CMA believed that there was a significant risk that prices would rise above justifiable levels in a number of sectors because of the COVID-19 outbreak, coupled with the restrictions on businesses and people. As of 17 May, the CMA had written to more than 200 traders about this issue. In its communication, the CMA asked for more information or expressed concern about what the CMA considered may be unjustifiable price increases.

By Jonathan Parker and Calum Warren

On 2 August 2017, the UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) launched a consultation on proposals to amend the Office of Fair Trading’s 2012 guidance as to the appropriate amount of a penalty for infringements of the prohibitions against anti-competitive agreements and an abuse of a dominant position contained in the Competition Act 1998 (the Current Penalties Guidance). The consultation proposes the following four main changes to the Current Penalties Guidance, most of which are clarifications to the CMA’s current policy based on its existing decisional practice. The CMA has not proposed any amendments in relation to the adjustment for duration (step 2) or the adjustment to prevent the maximum penalty being exceeded and to avoid double jeopardy (step 5).

1. The starting point for calculating fines (step 1). The Current Penalties Guidance provides that the starting point for a fine may be up to 30% of an undertaking’s turnover in the relevant product and geographic market in the last business year. Whilst the CMA does not consider detailing a starting point for every type of infringement appropriate, and confirms that there is no pre-set “tariff” for different infringements, the CMA proposes to amend the Current Penalties Guidance to state that it will generally use a starting point of:

(i) Between 21-30% for the most serious types of infringement (i.e., those which the CMA considers to be so-called “object” infringements, such as cartel offences, as well as excessive and predatory pricing)

(ii) Between 10-20% for certain less serious object infringements and for infringements by “effect” (i.e., those for which the CMA must carry out an assessment to establish that the behaviour in question has had an anti-competitive effect on the market)

(iii) Less than 10% may be applied if the assessment of the specific circumstances of the case leads to a downwards adjustment. If more than one undertaking has taken part in an infringement, the CMA proposes clarifying that it will expect to apply the same starting point for each undertaking.