— Posted by Gerd Heinen, DG MARKT, Retail financial services and consumer policy unit

Carrying a virtual train ticket or repaying a friend with your mobile phone, buying your groceries online, paying with your debit card abroad – the way European citizens shop and pay is radically changing.  A secure and transparent integrated payments environment throughout the EU could create more efficient, modern and safer means of payments – for the benefits of consumers, merchants and payment providers. Therefore, an integrated market for electronic payments is an important building block of the Commission’s Digital Agenda, and the Digital Single Market in particular.

 Today, the Commission had adopted a Green Paper ‘Towards an integrated European market for card, internet and mobile payments’ which assesses the current landscape of card, internet and mobile payments in Europe. Read the full entry

Number of views: 1546

— Posted by Patricia Lamotte, DG MARKT, Unité des services en ligne

Le shopping de Noël est à présent terminé et la période des soldes vient à peine de commencer. Chaque année, lors de cette période intense pour le commerce, on remarque que de plus en plus d’Européens effectuent leurs achats en ligne.

Pourtant trop d’obstacles gênent encore les consommateurs et les entreprises désireux de profiter pleinement des opportunités offertes par l’internet. A titre d’exemples, les consommateurs n’ont pas toujours confiance en la sécurité de leurs transactions ou peuvent être frustrés que les moyens de paiement soient limités. Il est fréquent en effet que les cartes de paiement étrangères ne soient pas acceptées.  Par ailleurs, les offres manquent souvent de transparence et les paiements comme les livraisons sont souvent trop chers. Pour couronner le tout, on trouve encore trop de contenus et produits illégaux ou contrefaits et les consommateurs sont inquiets du respect de leurs droits, notamment lorsqu’un problème survient.

C’est pourquoi la Commission européenne a adopté aujourd’hui la “Communication sur le commerce électronique et les services en ligne” qui vise à doubler la part du commerce électronique dans les ventes de détail (aujourd’hui 3,4%) et de la filière Internet dans le PIB européen (aujourd’hui moins de 3%) d’ici à 2015. 

Read the full entry

Number of views: 579

—Posted by Michal HRBATY, DG INFSO, Legal Officer, Workshop organiser at Digital Agenda Assembly

Lack of trust is seriously hampering e-commerce in Europe. Almost two thirds of consumers who had not made a cross-border distance purchase in 2010 were worried about falling victim to scams or frauds or cited concerns about what to do if problems arose and half of them were worried about delivery. Read the full entry

Number of views: 3227

— Posted by Robert Madelin, DG INFSO Director-General

I had a good discussion at the IIC Telecommunications & Media Forum, yesterday, the 13th of April. I was sharing with the participants my views of the Digital Single Market, one of the founding pillars of the Digital Agenda for Europe. My main points were that this is the key to European competitiveness especially during this historical economic downturn. Even in these times, the digital economy is growing faster than any other sector, and this should be the space where business innovators should find the ideal ground to develop their ideas and to create new wealth.

When Europeans think of the obstacles to the Digital Single Market they often think of the most obvious frustrations suffered by themselves as consumers, when they are denied to purchase goods in another Member States because their credit card is not accepted, or when they try to watch IP-TV abroad. Video on Demand (VOD) on the internet is simply not available in certain Member States and the offer is restricted in most of the others. Because of the lack of a Single Market in digital music, certain providers just decide not to offer their services in certain countries and thus de-facto to discriminate consumers because of their country of residence. This is something I and my colleagues are confronted to daily, through citizens messages and complaints. Read the full entry

Number of views: 2673