Online Shopping garners maximum complaints in China

Beijing, Nov 3: Majority complaints made by Chinese consumers in 2014 were about online shopping, a media report said on Tuesday.

The number of complaints and disputes related to internet shopping rose sharply and the network has become a breeding ground for counterfeits, a report by a law enforcement team under the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPC) said on Monday.

In 2014, Chinese industrial and commercial authorities dealt with 78,000 complaints concerning online shopping, up 356.6 percent year-on-year, the China Daily reported. Of the total of 20,135 cases taken on by consumer associations, 92.3 percent concerned online purchases, the report said.

“Ignoring consumers’ rights and selling counterfeits are very prominent in the online shopping industry,” Yan Junqi, vice-chairwoman of the NPC Standing Committee, said. She revealed that just 58.7 percent of products sold online were found to be authentic during a random inspection in 2014 by the State Administration of Industry and Commerce.

With the rise in complaints, the number of disputes caused by online purchases also went up, she said. Beijing Chaoyang District People’s Court has handled 107 such disputes since the revised Chinese Consumer Protection Law took effect on March 15, 2014, she said.

Yan suggested that the Supreme People’s Court should clarify the revised law by the end of this year and appealed to consumer associations to play their role.