The growth of e-commerce, whose turnover has exceeded 112 billion in France in 2020, has accelerated further in the context of the pandemic and has been accompanied by the emergence of marketplaces. These marketplaces bring together product offers covering all sectors and proposed by a multitude of sellers. Every year, the DGCCRF checks the safety and conformity of products offered for sale on these marketplaces. The investigation carried out in 2020, repeating two similar investigations in 2018 and 2019, again revealed high levels of non-compliance.
For consumers, making purchases on the Internet via the web portal of a recognised marketplace gives them more confidence than concluding a transaction on the portal of a seller whose reputation is not established. However, the products purchased on marketplaces are not supplied directly by the companies that run the portal. Sellers are not necessarily able or willing to master the regulations or standards applicable in the countries where their products are offered on these marketplaces.
In the target: lightening creams
In 2020, taking into account the results of previous investigations (which had revealed or confirmed the frequent non-compliance, or even the dangerousness, of certain product categories), the products targeted by the DGCCRF investigation were cosmetic creams with lightening purposes, multiple travel adapters, costume jewellery, autonomous smoke detectors and alarms (DAAF), medical devices for in vitro diagnosis, early-learning and/or plastic toys or even childcare articles (dummies, changing mattresses, bath bouncers).
The products purchased online (by “mystery shopping”, i.e. not showing the administration) on ten marketplaces among the most popular with Internet users were then analysed by the Joint Laboratory Service (SCL).
In particular, the following were investigated: the presence of prohibited substances in cosmetics, the presence of small elements that …
