Consumer Center
Implementation of the cancellation button often poor
Since July 2022, companies with which you can conclude contracts online must offer a button for easy cancellation. photo
© Andrea Warnecke/dpa-tmn
For a year now, providers have been obliged to set up a cancellation button for contracts on their website. However, this obligation is largely not fulfilled.
Even a year after the introduction of a mandatory cancellation button on websites, consumer advocates still often find shortcomings. Of the 2,946 websites that were examined at the end of June, only 42 percent implemented the button in accordance with the law, according to the Federal Association of Consumers (VZBV) in Berlin. In a first survey from November 2022, this rate was still 28 percent.
“We continue to observe that providers only provide the final cancellation form after the customer login,” said VZBV board member Ramona Pop. There are still considerable obstacles and problems for consumers if they want to terminate fixed-term contracts online.
According to the VZBV, it used a script for the survey that contained several Internet pages checked for a possible conclusion of fixed-term contracts. For this purpose, a targeted search was made for formulations that indicated the conclusion of a contract.
Since July 2022, anyone who concludes a contract online has been able to terminate it more easily. Since then, so-called continuing obligations that can be concluded online have had to have a cancellation button. With it, consumers can get rid of their contracts without much searching and writing letters. Examples are mobile phone contracts, subscriptions, contracts with fitness studios and streaming services.