Short answer
Before an online consumer contract is concluded, the trader must clearly and comprehensibly disclose the product's main characteristics, its identity and contact details, the total price and additional charges, payment and performance arrangements, complaint handling, withdrawal rights and exceptions, contract duration and termination, and specified guarantee and digital-product information. Immediately before the order, the consumer must see the core characteristics, total price and contractual duration or termination information, and must unambiguously acknowledge that the order entails payment.
Online marketplaces have additional duties concerning ranking, whether the seller is a trader, the consequences if it is not, and how contractual obligations are allocated. A trader must flag automated personalised pricing. Search providers must explain the main ranking parameters, disclose paid placement, and address review authenticity.
Disclosure is not a safe harbour. A false scarcity timer, disguised advertisement, fake review, skewed price presentation or interface that pressures or manipulates choice can remain prohibited even if formal information appears elsewhere. The Unfair Commercial Practices Directive (UCPD) usually governs business-to-consumer dark patterns; the Digital Services Act (DSA) adds a residual interface rule for online platforms where the practice is not covered by the UCPD or GDPR.
The core pre-contract information
For distance contracts, Article 6 of the (CRD) requires information in plain and intelligible language before the consumer is bound. The exact list depends on the product and contract, but ordinarily includes:
- the main characteristics of the goods, service or digital content;
- the trader's name, address, telephone number and email, plus the address for complaints if different;
- the total price inclusive of tax, all freight or other charges, or how price and unavoidable charges will be calculated;
- payment, delivery and performance arrangements and delivery timing;
- complaint handling, the legal conformity guarantee and relevant commercial guarantees or after-sales service;
- the withdrawal right, procedure, deadline and model form, return costs, or the fact that no right exists or may be lost;
- contract duration, automatic renewal and termination conditions, minimum commitment and deposits;
- for digital content, functionality, compatibility and interoperability; and
- where applicable, that the price was personalised using automated decision-making.
The information forms part of the contract and generally cannot later be changed without express agreement. The trader bears the burden of proving compliance. Sector-specific rules—for financial services, travel, food or energy, for example—may add to or displace parts of this regime.
The checkout must make payment unmistakable
Article 8(2) requires the core Article 6 information to be displayed clearly and prominently directly before the order. The button or equivalent function must make the payment consequence unambiguous:
If placing an order entails activating a button or a similar function, the button or similar function shall be labelled in an easily legible manner only with the words ‘order with obligation to pay’ or a corresponding unambiguous formulation indicating that placing the order entails an obligation to pay the trader. —
If that requirement is not met, the consumer is not bound by the order. Pre-ticked boxes cannot create additional payments, and charges cannot be concealed until after the headline offer.
Marketplaces, rankings, reviews and personalised prices
The , whose national measures have applied since 28 May 2022, modernised both the CRD and UCPD.
Before a marketplace contract, CRD Article 6a requires general information on the main parameters determining ranking and their relative importance. It also requires the marketplace to state, from the seller's declaration, whether the seller is a trader. If not, it must warn that EU consumer rights do not apply to that contract. It must explain any non-standard allocation of obligations between seller and marketplace. These disclosures do not, by themselves, make the marketplace the seller or require it to describe a ranking algorithm in source-code detail.
Under UCPD Article 7(4a), a search facility covering products from different traders or consumers must make the main ranking parameters and their relative importance directly and easily accessible from the results page. Annex I point 11a separately prohibits presenting paid higher placement without clearly disclosing paid advertising or payment specifically made to achieve that ranking.
If a trader displays reviews, Article 7(6) makes material its information about whether and how it checks that reviews come from actual users or purchasers. Annex I prohibits claiming reviews are from real users without reasonable and proportionate verification steps, and prohibits submitting, commissioning or misrepresenting fake reviews or endorsements.
Personalised pricing has a narrower disclosure rule. CRD Article 6(1)(ea) requires notice that the price was personalised on the basis of automated decision-making. It does not itself prohibit personalisation or require disclosure of every input. GDPR duties and discrimination law may apply independently. Nor does the label cure a misleading comparison, hidden mandatory charge or false claim that the price is uniquely favourable.
For announced price reductions, the amended Price Indication Directive generally requires the “prior price”—normally the lowest price applied by that trader during at least the previous 30 days—subject to national rules for perishables, new arrivals and progressive reductions.
A disclosure breach and a deceptive design are different questions
UCPD Articles 6 and 7 prohibit misleading actions and omissions likely to cause the average consumer to take a transactional decision they otherwise would not. Information can be unlawful because it is false, because material facts are absent, or because facts are hidden, ambiguous, unintelligible or supplied too late. Article 8 separately covers harassment, coercion and undue influence that significantly impair freedom of choice.
The Court of Justice made the separation explicit in Canal Digital Danmark:
The fact that a trader provides, in an invitation to purchase, all the information listed in Article 7(4) of that directive does not preclude that invitation from being regarded as a misleading commercial practice within the meaning of Article 6(1) or Article 7(2) of that directive. —
In that case, highlighting a monthly price while omitting or visually subordinating a six-monthly charge could mislead. A link or later checkout total does not necessarily undo the initial distortion. Medium limitations matter to an omission assessment, but not as permission to make an affirmative presentation misleading.
An “invitation to purchase” also begins earlier than the final checkout. In Ving Sverige, C-122/10, it existed once product and price information was sufficient to enable a transactional decision; an immediate purchase mechanism was unnecessary. “Transactional decision” includes steps before buying, such as entering a shop or progressing through a funnel.
Countdown timers and other pressure tactics
Some practices in UCPD Annex I are always unfair; no further average-consumer assessment is required. Point 7 prohibits:
Falsely stating that a product will only be available for a very limited time, or that it will only be available on particular terms for a very limited time, in order to elicit an immediate decision and deprive consumers of sufficient opportunity or time to make an informed choice. —
A timer that resets, an “only two left” claim unsupported by inventory, or a sale that routinely restarts may fit that prohibition. A genuinely expiring offer is not automatically unlawful, but its accuracy does not settle whether the overall design is misleading or aggressive. Repeated interruptions, obstruction of comparison, confirm-shaming, visual prominence that steers acceptance, or making cancellation materially harder than sign-up may engage Articles 6–9 depending on context and effect.
What the DSA adds—and what it leaves to consumer law
DSA Article 25 applies to providers of online platforms, not every online trader. It states:
Providers of online platforms shall not design, organise or operate their online interfaces in a way that deceives or manipulates the recipients of their service or in a way that otherwise materially distorts or impairs the ability of the recipients of their service to make free and informed decisions. —
But Article 25(2) excludes practices covered by the UCPD or GDPR. It is therefore a gap-filling platform rule, not a duplicate cause of action for the same consumer practice. The DSA separately requires advertisement identification and targeting information (Article 26), recommender-system parameters (Article 27), and trader traceability for marketplaces (Article 30). Most DSA obligations have applied since 17 February 2024; some platform duties have size-based exclusions, while very large platforms face additional rules.
Conclusion
Compliance requires two audits. The first checks whether every CRD, marketplace, ranking, review, pricing and checkout disclosure appears clearly, at the right time and in the right place. The second asks whether the journey as a whole misleads, pressures or manipulates. A complete disclosure list cannot rescue a false timer, fake review, disguised paid ranking or distorted headline price. Conversely, not every persuasive design is unlawful: the legal test depends on accuracy, materiality, timing, context, consumer effect and, for DSA Article 25, whether another EU regime already covers the practice.
Sources
This article provides general legal information, not advice for a specific matter. Laws, facts and procedural deadlines may change the result. Follow the linked primary sources and obtain local advice before acting.