More than 24.000 complains have been submitted to the EU’s Online Dispute Resolution platform in 2016. More than one third of the complains are about trans-boundary transactions within the EU. The Greek Consumer Ombudsman released some data on the one year anniversary since the establishment of the platform.

The Greek Consumer Ombudsman was linked with the ODR European platform on February 15th 2016. All the complains were resolved within an average time of 48 days, when the legal maximum limit is 90 days. 75% were complains from Greece while the remaining 25% was trans-boundary complains.

Norway, Iceland and Lichtenstein will be linked with the platform by the end of this year.

A few examples of the complains submitted are:

– A consumer from Luxemburg complained about a car he had rented from a Greek company. The complain was resolved in 60 days and the consumer got a full refund.

– A Belgian consumer was unsuccessfully complaining for months about a defective hairdryer he had bought from a shop in Belgium. When the complain came from the European platform, the shop owner voluntarily contacted the consumer and replaced the product.