After making payment to a merchant through an e-commerce platform, a consumer does not receive the commodity on time. In his efforts to protect his rights, he finds that the merchant has exited this platform.

How can a consumer protect his rights under such a situation? What judgment would the court give to protect the consumer's legal rights? You will find answers to these questions in the judgment of this typical case.

Case summary

The plaintiff is a consumer on an e-commerce platform, and the defendant is the platform operator. The plaintiff paid 1,459 yuan to buy an air-conditioner at a shop on the platform. The shop owner failed to fulfill the required delivery on time, and canceled the order without the plaintiff's consent. The plaintiff then contacted the platform's customer service staff to report the relevant situation, and ask the platform to handle the dispute.

Ten days later, the customer service staff telephoned the plaintiff, telling him that the commodity couldn't be delivered because the shop had left the platform. The staff suggested that the plaintiff directly contact the merchant to get a refund and said that the platform could only give a small amount of compensation.

The plaintiff was dissatisfied with this response, believing that the defendant, as the operator of the e-commerce platform, bears the responsibility of examining the merchant's qualification and supervising the transaction process. The plaintiff claimed that the defendant should compensate him first.

The defendant argued that the operator of the e-commerce platform didn't have any sales contract with the plaintiff when he bought an air-conditioner from a third-party shop operating on the platform. The defendant argued that it had fulfilled its legal obligations by publicly declaring that the shop in question fell under the provision of the Article 10 of the Electronic Commerce Law, where no business registration is required, and by providing the personal information of the merchant in the litigation process.

After hearing the case, the court found that the shop in question applied for closure one week after the dispute arose and exited the platform after a 30-day public notice period.

The court also found that the defendant formulated relevant rules to manage the exit of individual merchants. According to the rules, merchants may only exit after fulfilling responsibilities such as delivering commodities and resolving existing disputes.

After trial, the Beijing Internet Court determined that:

The plaintiff reached an online sales contract with this shop operating on the e-commerce platform by purchasing the commodity. The defendant, as the operator of the e-commerce platform, provided services for this transaction, including offering an online operation platform and publishing related information.

Under Article 44 of the Law on the Protection of Consumer Rights and Interests and Article 38 of the Electronic Commerce Law, consumers who buy commodities on an e-commerce platform and believe that their rights have been infringed upon should seek compensation from the sellers. However, when the e-commerce platform operator fails to provide the real name, address and contact information of the seller, or fails to offer consumer-friendly assurances, or if they knew or should have known that an merchant was infringing upon consumers' legal rights through the platform, consumers can seek compensation from the platform operator.

In this case, the plaintiff bought the commodity on the platform operated by the defendant, and the shop in question failed to deliver the product in accordance with the contract and canceled the order, constituting the infringement. The plaintiff immediately brought the situation to the customer service staff's attention after finding the order was canceled.

The defendant acknowledged that the shop in question had failed to fulfill its obligations. However, even though the dispute was not handled properly, the defendant allowed the shop to exit the platform without strictly examining whether it met the exit rules. Therefore, the defendant should bear joint liability because this not only violated relevant laws and regulations on protecting consumers' rights and interests, but also contravened its own rules concerning merchant exit.

Details of the judgment

The court ordered the defendant to refund the plaintiff and pay interest on the refunded amount from the day when the purchase order was canceled to the day when the refund is paid.

The judgment has taken effect and been enforced.

Tips from the judge

A good e-commerce environment serves as the important foundation for consolidating consumer confidence and sustainably unleashing consumption potential. The Electronic Commerce Law clearly stipulates that an e-commerce platform operator should fulfill their duties of maintaining order on the platform and protecting consumers' legal rights and interests, and it should formulate service articles and trade rules in a transparent, fair and impartial manner in order to clarify the rights and obligations of the concerned parties.

When an online shop chooses to exit the platform, which might harm the consumers' rights and lead to failure to provide after-sales service, the platform operator should carefully review whether there are unresolved issues concerning commodity delivery, exchanges and refunds, or quality guarantee, and make it clear that the merchant shall offer relevant service even after exiting the platform.

In this case, the plaintiff informed the defendant on the violation of the merchant. However, the defendant still allowed the merchant to exit the platform without honoring the contract. Therefore, the defendant infringed upon the plaintiff's legal rights and interests, and should be held accountable.