Governmental Report Proposes a New Swedish Consumer Protection Act

It is becoming increasingly common for consumers to make cross-border purchases and consumers are offered goods with digital content and digital services. Following the EU-directive (2019/771) on certain aspects concerning contracts for the sale of goods and directive (2019/770) on certain aspects concerning contracts for the supply of digital content and digital services, the Swedish government in 2019 initiated an inquiry in order to review Swedish legislation in the area.

The final report is proposing that the current Swedish Consumer Sales Act dating back to 1990, is replaced by a new act – the Consumer Protection Act on purchases and certain other agreements. The new act is supposed to apply to consumers' purchases of goods, regardless of whether it takes place in a store or online. Moreover, the new act would in contrast to the current act apply to the purchase of digital content or digital services, for instance when downloading music and movies.

It is also proposed that the new act would introduce several other news. For instance, the new act proposes a provision meaning that the buyer can turn to a third party (rather than the seller) who has provided a warranty. If it is the manufacturer of the product who has left the warranty, and the manufacturer has undertaken to be responsible for the durability of the product for a certain period of time, the consumer always has the right to demand that the manufacturer remedy the defect or undertake redelivery. Furthermore, it is proposed that the conditions for the warranty should sometimes be those stated in the marketing of the good.

The report proposes that the new act shall enter into force on 1 January 2022. It remains to be seen what the next legislative step will be.

Authored by: Erik Ullberg and Richard Fürst