Network Group Buying Legal Issues Research

Group buying website Groupon.com was established in Chicago,USA in November2008. Groupon.com, as the founder of onlinegroup buying, attract business men all over the world to follow suitfor its simple operation and clear profit mode. Online group buyingfor its convenience, preferential prices which can attract largeconsumer groups in a short time, has become one of the leadingways of network consumption.,since its debut in China in2010.In China, online group buying is divided into three types for itsdifferent initiators, they are group buying started by consumers,group buying triggered by business men, and group buying initiatedby the third party organization. In this paper, the author will focus ongroup buying started by third party organization, the body of whichconsists of consumers, business men, and group buying websites.Online group buying has already two-year development historyin China.It has experienced its full swing, but problems andcomplaints come along.It’s the main reason that online group buyinglacks related legal regulations. There so many kinds of online groupbuying in China, such as specific goods group buying, living service group buying, navigation group buying. These problem are all thispaper aims to that which position the online group buying is as oneof the body of third party organization, the different legalrelationship and nature between consumers and business men indifferent situation. The author will analyze the nature from agents,brokers, intermediators and platform providers and then provideanalysis on the legal nature of different kinds of online groupbuying.The paper aims to research on network buying in legal aspect.The author thinks it important to systematically analyze and makesolutions to the problems occurred in the development of groupbuying correspondingly, and hopes the paper will be of some help tothe healthy and stable development of online group buying in China.