March 15: World Consumer Rights Day

Manuel Van den Broucke, sports, society and politics correspondent, March 15, 2025

Origin of World Consumer Rights Day

World Consumer Rights Day, celebrated every March 15 since 1983, was launched by Consumers International, a global federation of consumer organizations, in reference to John F. Kennedy's speech of March 15, 1962, in which he recognized consumers' rights to safety, information, choice, and to be heard.

Fundamental consumer rights

The right to safety ensures that products placed on the market pose no danger to consumers. The right to information, meanwhile, is upheld by regulations such as the requirement, in force in Europe since 2014, to clearly list ingredients and allergens on food packaging. The right to choice is protected by decisions such as the European Commission's €4.34 billion fine against Google in 2018 for abusing its dominant position on Android. The right to be heard takes the form of class actions, such as the lawsuit against Volkswagen after Dieselgate, which resulted in compensation for thousands of consumers. The right to repair, enshrined in several recent laws such as France's mandatory repairability index for electronic products since 2021, strengthens the fight against planned obsolescence and makes it easier to maintain devices. Finally, the right to a healthy environment is gaining ground with initiatives such as the ban on single-use plastics in the European Union since 2021.

The most common abuses consumers face

Planned obsolescence is one of the most common abuses, as demonstrated by the Apple scandal in 2017, when the company was found guilty of deliberately slowing down older iPhones to encourage customers to buy new models. Misleading business practices are frequent, as in 2013, when horse meat was found in ready meals sold as containing only beef, a scandal that notably affected Findus. Hidden fee fraud is another common abuse, particularly with airline tickets, where companies like Ryanair and EasyJet have been penalized by European courts for adding non-transparent extra charges. Personal data theft is also a growing threat: in 2019, Facebook was fined $5 billion in the United States for mishandling users' personal information. The banking sector is no exception, with abusive practices such as excessive overdraft fees, which led France to cap these fees at 25 euros per month for financially struggling customers in 2019.