Brussels has accepted Amazon’s commitments. On December 20, the giant promised to limit its use of data from sellers in its marketplace while guaranteeing equal access to Prime as well as to its Buy Box (the “Add to cart” purchase button).
In July 2019, the European Commission opened a first investigation into Amazon. The institution criticized him for excessive use of non-public data from sellers on his marketplace. A second was initiated a little later, in November 2020, regarding Amazon’s Buy Box. It focused specifically on the criteria set by the company to select the winner of the button and to determine whether these criteria allow sellers to offer products under its Prime program. Jeff Bezos’ firm has made commitments “ legally binding in order to put an end to its practices deemed anti-competitive by the Commission.
Amazon discussed with the Commission for a long time before agreeing on legally binding commitments
Brussels believed that Amazon was abusing its dominant position in the French, German and Spanish markets with regard to the provision of online marketplace services to third-party sellers. The European Commission considered that the rules put in place for Prime and its Buy Box quite voluntarily favored its own retail business as well as sellers who had agreed to use its logistics and delivery services.
Amazon has, between July and September 2022, delivered its initial commitments to the European Commission, since retouched by the institution. The e-merchant thus undertakes, definitively, to improve the presentation of the second competing Buy Box offer. How ? By making it visible and including a review mechanism, in case the presentation does not attract enough customers to the site.
The group also promises to be transparent by increasing the flow of early information to sellers and carriers. This concerns in particular newly acquired commitments and rights which, among other things, allow sellers to switch to independent carriers. The latter will see the methods of contacting customers arranged, but in compliance with data protection rules.
Multi-year commitments
Among the other commitments made by Amazon, we can note the improvement of the protection of carriers’ data vis-à-vis Amazon’s competing logistics services, and more particularly of information on the type of product or products transported. A centralized complaint mechanism, open to all sellers and carriers, will be set up and accessible in the event of suspicion of non-compliance with commitments.
As for the duration of the commitments relating to Prime and the second competing Buy Box offer, Amazon has agreed to increase it to 7 years. Initially, the e-merchant offered a term of 5 years. The European Commission ” found that Amazon’s Definitive Commitments will ensure the company does not use Marketplace seller data for its own retail operations and grants non-discriminatory access to Buy Box and Prime “.
These commitments apply to all of Amazon’s European markets, current and future. Italy, where the competition authority had already imposed corrective measures on the firm, is obviously exempt. ” The final commitments will remain in effect for seven years for Prime and the display of the second competing Buy Box offer, and five years for the rest of the commitments. “, confirms Brussels. In the event of a breach of the commitments, Amazon is liable to a fine of up to 10% of its annual worldwide turnover.
For its part, Amazon reacted by saying that it was satisfied “ for responding to the concerns of the European Commission and for resolving these issues. Although we still disagree with several of the European Commission’s preliminary conclusions, we have engaged in a constructive approach to preserve our ability to serve customers across Europe and the more than 225,000 European small and medium-sized enterprises that sell in our stores. In 2021 alone, European SMEs on Amazon generated more than €14.5 billion in export sales.
Source : European Commission
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