Sale of Goods and Supply of Digital Content and Digital Services – Overview of Directives 2019/770 and 2019/771

Abstract

Directive (EU) 2019/770 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 May 2019 on certain aspects concerning contracts for the supply of digital content and digital services and Directive (EU) 2019/771 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 May 2019 concerning contracts for the sale of goods, amending Regulation (EU) 2017/2394 and Directive 2009/22/EC, and repealing Directive 1999/44/EC were published in the Official Journal of the European Union on 22 May 2019. They represent a major challenge for consumer law at European level. More and more areas of the law are being harmonised, coming closer to comprehensive regulation of consumer contracts at EU level. Even though Directive 2019/771 gives more freedom to Member States than Directive 2019/770, the similarities between the two Directives are clearly more significant than the differences. This could be an interesting opportunity for the Member States, which may decide to adopt a unified legal regime on conformity and lack of conformity for all consumer contracts.