Consumer contracts

Notable cases in which members of chambers have been involved include:

• Beavis v ParkingEye Ltd [2015] UKSC 67: landmark Supreme Court case on whether an £85 parking charge constituted a penalty at common law and/or was an unfair contract term;
• Secretary of State for Business Innovation and Skills v PLT Anti-Marketing Ltd [2015] EWCA Civ 76: ‘material information’ for purposes of regulation 6 of the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008;
• R v X Ltd [2013] EWCA Crim 818: Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008; sale in homes of security systems; ‘commercial practice’ can derive from single incident; meaning of ‘transactional decision’;
• Dorset CC v Alpine Elements Ltd [2013]: Unfair Commercial Practices Directive inapplicable to package travel case;
• The Secretary of State for Business Innovation and Skills v PLT Anti-Marketing Limited [2013] EWHC 3626 (Ch): application in a winding up petition; scope of regulation 6 of the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008 (‘misleading omissions’); permission to appeal to the Court of Appeal granted;
• Watersheds Capital Partners Ltd v Dudley [2013]: High Court litigation on definition of “consumer”; individual selling business to fund retirement; unfair terms;
• R .v. Scottish and Southern Energy PLC (CA) (2012) 176 J.P. 241; [2012] C.T.L.C. 1: doorstep sales; electricity supply industry;
• R v Christopher Steele [2012] C.T.L.C. 109: building works; one-off acts not amounting to ‘commercial practice’;
• R v UK Parking Control Ltd [2012] EWCA Crim 1560; [2012] C.T.L.C. 48: company providing parking management facilities; misleading commercial practice;
• Kaye v Nu Skin UK Ltd [2012] EWHC 958 (QB); [2012] C.T.L.C. 69: trading schemes; arbitration clauses; incorporation and reasonableness;
• Brighton and Hove CC v Towers Property Developments Ltd [2011] EWHC (Ch): first Part 8 EA 2002 and CPUT Regs enforcement against land banking company;
• OFT v. First National Bank Plc [2002] 1 AC 481: interpretation of the fairness test in the 1999 Regulations; post-judgment interest

Works written by (or contributed to by) members of chambers include:

• ‘Trading Standards: Law and Practice‘ (‘the Pink Book’) (Jordans – 2013)
• ‘Enforcement of Consumer Rights and Protections‘ (2015)
• Atkin’s Court Forms on Consumer Protection (Butterworths – July 2008)
• ‘The Enforcement of Regulatory Offences’ (Sweet & Maxwell, 1998)
• contributions to Current Law.

Our Trading Law Bulletin is a free quarterly digest of relevant cases and developments in the area of consumer and regulatory law. The TLB can be posted to you, however the current issue and all back issues are available online.

Since 2007, we have published our own set of law reports, the Consumer and Trading Law Cases (CTLCs), covering cases of particular interest for lawyers dealing with consumer and regulatory law, most of which are not reported elsewhere.

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