No more barriers incommunity e-commerce. From today, Monday 3th December, it will be possible to shop online on sites throughout the European Union without running into geographical limitations. Brussels has in fact decided to ban the practice of "geoblocking”, which has so far allowed sellers to block purchases from different states or with foreign credit cards.
But that's not all: sites that have multiple versions depending on the country – car rental companies, hotel chains, concert ticket sellers, online service providers and much more – they will no longer be able to redirect customers or refuse to sell promotional offers featured on one of their country pages to people logging in from other countries.
As for physical products, from clothing to technology, sellers they will no longer be able to refuse transactions because their delivery service does not cover the country where the buyer resides. The parties will have to reach an agreement: for example, the customer will be able to pick up the purchase directly from the merchant or have it sent to a location covered by the seller's shipping service.
Attention: the abolition of the geo-blocking it does not apply to copyrighted products such as music, movies, software, and video games. In these cases the principle of territoriality remains valid. However, the EU Commission has announced that it will review the situation in 2020 and decide whether to cancel "geoblocking" also for music, e-books, video games and software.
Andrus Ansip, vice president of the EU Commission for the digital single market, recalled that “in 2015, 63% of sites did not allow users to make purchases from another EU country, as a result two-thirds of consumers who wanted to shop online abroad were unable to do so”.
Now, Ansip added, “let's put an end to this practice. We want a Europe without barriers, and this also means eliminating obstacles to online purchases”.
