Protection Of Consumers' Rights And Interests In Cross-border Online Shopping

With the rapid development of economic globalization,many consumers in China are conducting cross-border shopping through the convenient Internet and the gradually maturing international express business to obtain higher quality products and services,which is commonly known as "cross-border online shopping".Consumers buy products on foreign e-commerce platform,which went through international transportation and finally reached the hands of consumers in China.Despite longer delivery time,limited variety of commodities and the unpredictable customs clearance time,consumers,especially the young are still attracted by the lower prices,more assured quality and orders unlimited by time and place.Cross-border online shopping is very different from traditional online shopping within China in that the transactions are transnational with ordering,payment and transportation inevitably involving two or more countries.Remote online consumption depends heavily on the Internet and international logistics.The dispute resolution over "cross-border online shopping" is very complicated and consumers' complaints are often left unattended.In the process of cross-border online shopping,there are mainly three parties: consumers,overseas cross-border e-commerce platforms and express companies.The delivery of commodities is usually carried out in the following three modes concerning different legal relationship and responsibilities of the three parties.Although the whole process of cross-border shopping is convenient and fast because it breaks through traditional geographical restrictions,the lack of after-sales service,delivery time delay,misleading and distorted information,false and exaggerated advertising,fake and shoddy goods cause infringement on consumers' right to be informed,right to fair deals and personal privacy.Investigation and evidence obtaining difficulties,the hard determination of tort liability,unclarified court jurisdiction and unclear regulatory responsibility are among the legal setbacks encountered by consumers when they want to safeguard their rights.These problems stand in the way of consumer rights protection.At present,the protection of consumers' rights and interests in cross-border online shopping in China mainly relies on the legal system with the Law on Protection of Consumers' Rights and Interests and the E-commerce Law as the core,as well as the relevant parts on consumer rights and interests protection in the Contract Law,logistics and cross-border electronic payment laws.These laws combined reflected some breakthrough in the protection for cross-border consumers,including their rights to regret stipulated in the Law on Protection of Consumers' Rights and Interests and the protection of consumers' rights and interests in the E-commerce Law provisions.However,the shopping mode of the new cross-border online business is obviously different from that of traditional shopping,which means existing law may not be necessarily directly applicable in terms of pertinence and systematic problems.To sum up,China's laws and regulations for the protection of the rights and interests of crossborder online shopping consumers are not perfect,and there are loopholes and deficiencies in the legislation.If the new legislation does not keep up with the situation,we can play the role of judicial interpretation,such as exploring the corresponding basis of extraterritorial application of Consumer Rights and Interests Protection Law of China and the right to regret.The U.S.has protected the rights and interests of cross-border online shopping consumers from the protection of the right to be informed,the protection of personal information,as well as the supervision of logistics and electronic payment through The B2 C E-commerce Guidelines,The Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act,The Consumer Privacy Protection Act,The Private Express Company Law,and The Electronic Fund Transfer Act.The United States adopted the credit rating system and the website adopted a series of operations to facilitate consumers' rights protection,and the paper introduced the framework,steps and development trend of the American Online Dispute Resolution.The EU has protected the rights and interests of consumers from the protection of personal information,the protection of the right to be informed,as well as the protection of the right to fair deals through EU Data Protection Directive,EU Privacy and Electronic Communications(e-Privacy Directive),EU Remote Marketing Directive,The Unfair Contract Terms Directive of EU,Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council on the Protection of Consumers in Respect of Distance Contracts.The EU has adopted a third party except court to resolve online disputes between enterprises and consumers due to online contracts,and the paper introduced the corresponding principles,recommendations,procedures and existing problems.Cross-border online shopping is divided into two stages: domestic and overseas.In the process of domestic transportation,China protects the rights and interests of consumers by improving its own laws.In terms of transportation,we should improve the legislation on cross-border logistics,strengthen industry supervision,give full play to the role of industry associations,and clarify responsibility body.In terms of electronic payment,we should reasonably allocate supervision and management responsibilities,improve the consumer protection mechanism for payment services provided by non-financial institutions,and establish a liability mechanism for unauthorized payment transactions.In terms of the construction of ODR,improving the corresponding system and platform construction and maintenance are significant.International cooperation should be strengthened to protect the rights and interests of cross-border online shopping consumers,including the establishment of a new better global online dispute resolution mechanism.At the same time,we should build a thirdparty complaint platform,provide logistics tracking visualization services and establish a regional cross-border electronic payment supervision and cooperation mechanism.Of course,legislation and cooperation are not achieved overnight,and the framework of the system also needs time to be polished,so as to determine the best solution according to the specific situation in practice.As a new consumption trend," cross-border online shopping" has a considerable number of people,and there are many regrets about its process positioning and consumer protection.I hope that in the future,China can formulate more targeted legislation to effectively protect the rights and interests of " Cross-border online shopping" consumers,as well as a more mature and orderly Online Dispute Resolution Mechanism and other convenient measures under the global scope can be formed.