GOVERNING LAWS

Whilst the Rules of Racing play a role in determining certain integrity matters in business-to-consumer (B2C) offers, public law requires fairness and transparency in B2C offers and are subject to Trading Standards and/or Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) enforcement action.

Syndicators and racing club businesses are required by law to portray offers to consumers, in a fair, honest and transparent manner. There are three relevant elements of consumer protection legislation, the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008, the Consumer Rights Act 2015 and the Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013.

The following has been submitted by Trading Standards:-

Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008

The Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008 (henceforth the CPRs) address unfair commercial practices by traders when dealing with consumers, creating associated criminal offences.

A consumer is defined as "...an individual acting for purposes that are wholly or mainly outside that individual's business."

A trader is "...a person acting for purposes relating to that person's business, whether acting personally or through another person acting in the trader's name or on the trader's behalf and [except in relation to consumer's rights to redress] includes a person acting in the name of or on behalf of a trader."

A commercial practice is defined as "...any act, omission, course of conduct, representation or commercial communication (including advertising and marketing) by a trader, which is directly connected with the promotion, sale or supply of a product to or from consumers, whether occurring before, during or after a commercial transaction (if any) in relation to a product."

A product includes goods, a service, digital content, immovable property, rights or obligations and a trader who demands payment from a consumer in full or partial settlement of their liabilities, or purported liabilities, is considered to be offering to supply a product to the consumer.

Goods means any tangible moveable items, with certain proviso for water, gas and electricity.

Consumer Rights Act 2015

The Consumer Rights Act 2015 (henceforth the CRA) provides consumers with certain statutory rights when being supplied with goods and/or services by traders. It also prohibits the use of unfair terms in consumer contracts (those between consumers and traders with the exception of contracts of employment or apprenticeship). Under the CRA a trader claiming that an individual was not a consumer must prove it.

The CRA defines a consumer as "...an individual acting for purposes that are wholly or mainly outside that individual's trade, business, craft or profession." However, for many of the CRA's provisions a person is not a consumer in relation to a sales contract if the goods are second-hand goods sold at public auction, provided individuals have the opportunity of attending the sale in person.

A trader is defined as "...a person acting for purposes relating to that person's trade, business, craft or profession, whether acting personally or through another person acting in the trader's name or on the trader's behalf."

Goods has the same definition as in the CPRs.

Generally, a trader cannot rely on a term that attempts to restrict a consumer's statutory rights in relation to either goods or services.

Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013

The Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013 (henceforth ICAC) apply to most contracts between consumers and traders and introduce rules around the provision of information to consumers as well as a 14 day cooling off period during which a consumer can choose to cancel certain contracts provided it were agreed away from business premises or via a distance method ( such as online or over the phone).

ICAC differentiates between sales contracts and service contracts.

A sales contract "...means a contract under which a trader transfers or agrees to transfer the ownership of goods to a consumer and the consumer pays or agrees to pay the price, including any contract that has both goods and services as its object."

A service contract "...means a contract, other than a sales contract, under which a trader supplies or agrees to supply a service to a consumer and the consumer agrees to pay the price."

Definitions of consumer and trader are identical to those in the CRA.