The American giant is accused of illegally promoting its products on the platform.
US internet giant Amazon is the subject of a 900 million pound lawsuit brought on behalf of millions of users in the UK that accuses it of illegally promoting its products on its platform. The suit is due to be filed by the end of October at the London Competition Appeal Court and will argue that the tech giant is abusing its dominant position and harming consumers, according to a statement released on Thursday.
The lawsuit, led by consumer rights activist Julie Hunter, claims that Amazon is inducing, through “a secret algorithm that promotes it”, users to click on its section “buy-box(shopping box). According to this press release, there are products sold directly by the platform or by third-party sellers.who pay huge storage and delivery coststo find himself put forward. “More than 80% of purchases on Amazon are made via the offers contained in the +Buy Box+“, but “many independent sellers are excluded even when they offer the same product for less“, According to the press release. In a statement received by AFP on Thursday, Amazon replies that the complaint is “unfounded» and that the e-commerce giant «always strives to support the 85,000 businesses that sell their products on (its) store in the UK“. “Over half of our physical product sales on our UK site come from Independent Seller Partners“adds Amazon.
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In the sights of the European Commission
In July, Amazon had proposed an agreement to close two investigations by the European Commission, which suspects it of violating competition rules, in particular in the preferential treatment of sellers using its delivery services. The platform is committed to ensuring a “equal treatment for all sellers” for the “buy-box” and “to display a second competing offer“. In particular, it promised, as part of its Prime program, to allow sellers “to freely choose any carrier» . The European Commission, which opened an investigation in July 2019, also criticizes Amazon for relying on commercial data from independent retailers to calibrate its own offer. However, an agreement has not yet been reached and discussions are continuing.
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In Italy, the competition policeman in December 2021 imposed a fine on Amazon of 1.128 billion euros for having discriminated against sellers who had not used its logistics service. The firm appealed. US tech giants are frequently accused of breaking competition rules. Google was heavily sanctioned by the EU, for a cumulative total of 8 billion euros. Microsoft has also received several European sanctions for having imposed its Internet Explorer browser. Apple has been accused since May 2022 of abuse of a dominant position in contactless payments.