Cyberday 2024 | Four practical recommendations for clients and suppliers

A review of our processes in the days before and during Cyberday can be very useful in reducing risks and contingencies.

From June 3 to 5, a new version of Cyberday will be held with the participation of more than 770 brands and the support of the Santiago Chamber of Commerce and the Regional Chambers of Commerce.

This e-commerce event is one of the most important of the year and implies a significant increase in transactions carried out through electronic platforms.

For this reason, it is common to notice how companies prepare to correctly address this type of events, allowing safe operation, the reduction of contingencies and, of course, the due protection of consumer rights.

It is important to highlight that these types of events not only generate an increase in the activity of companies, but also of the supervisory authority. During last year, the National Consumer Service (Sernac) received more than 700 complaints just on the occasion of Cyberday 2023, which implied that the authority initiated several procedures for information requirements from suppliers to check if they were actually They verified violations of the regulations.

On the other hand, in addition to Law No. 19,496 on the Protection of Consumer Rights, in this type of events the Electronic Commerce Regulations must also be considered, which  establishes the duty to report the total price of the product or service, including the shipping value, the lack of stock of the product, and the relevant characteristics, among others.

Where do consumer complaints focus on this type of e-commerce events? Mainly, unilateral purchase cancellations, lack of stock and false or drip prices.

In this way, the az team has prepared the following recommendations so that our clients and suppliers can verify certain key elements during the development of Cyberday 2024.

• Let’s not leave logistics aside. Just as it is important to sell to consumers, it is also important to deliver. In this sense, it will be key to have a solid dispatch chain and customer service prepared for this type of events.
• Updated Terms and Conditions. Many suppliers include in their terms and conditions the possibility of delays in the delivery of products when these types of events occur in which there are massive purchases. Now, we suggest not hiding behind this clause and committing times with clients that are actually feasible to meet. Although Cyberdays have quite specific events that represent an overload to our logistics operation, the authority has maintained on several occasions that this type of thing is feasible for companies to attend to with enough time, so they must comply with the reported delivery time.
• Stock availability. Key element. Here the obligation does not imply reporting in real time the number of products available, no matter how automated our system is, this is a very complex task to achieve. What we should aim for is to inform consumers when a product is no longer available and, therefore, it is not feasible to buy it and include it in the shopping cart, etc. The bad scenario that we must avoid is one in which the consumer purchases a product, without stock, is not informed about it, and then the purchase is canceled unilaterally.
• Publication of prices. Cyberday is characterized by having real product offers, which are uploaded and downloaded by platform providers as Cyberday progresses. Therefore, an error in the publication of a price is not only common, but can also be quite serious. We do ourselves a good favor when we “double click” in our price upload and publication procedures in order to reduce the risks of making a mistake when uploading the information to the electronic platform.

All of these recommendations may be quite basic and practical, but a review of our processes the days before and during Cyberday can be very useful in reducing risks and contingencies.

At az we have a Consumer Law team with enough experience to support our clients in these matters on a day-to-day basis.

If you have doubts regarding these recommendations or need support in reviewing your processes, you can write to our Public Law and Regulated Markets group:

Antonio Rubilar | Partner | arubilar@az.cl

Gonzalo Bravo | Senior Associate | gbravo@az.cl

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