The European Commission has published its draft regulations and guidelines on Vertical Restraints Regulation (VRR) and offered more safeguards to online-only businesses than many had expected.

This is good news as it preserves the consumer’s right to choose – which is what this blog’s ethos is all about.

Many have welcomed the move. eBay, which owns this blog (but commissions an independent writer), makes the following points:

“The Commission recognizes that many products need not be sold in brick and mortar stores and has introduced important tests that will prevent potential new abuses by suppliers who may attempt to unjustifiably exclude online-only distributors.

“The Commission also encourages competition authorities to support efficient distribution channels that benefit consumer choice, and we will certainly work with Member States by being vigilant and exposing any attempts to unfairly limit online sales.”

Consumerchoice.eu is proud to have played whatever small part it contributed in the EC’s decision process, and thanks all of our readers who took part in the consultation.

We will continue to publicise any examples of consumers’ right to choose being eroded.

Online price comparison site Pricerunner has taken the next step and compared prices offline as well – and it’s not good news for the buyer, who is paying an average of 31.79% higher than the online cost when the go into a shop.

The company did a mystery shopping exercise in several cities in the UK. It appears Manchester is where you’ll find the highest differential, where a basket of 10 items cost £562 more then the online cost of £1785.11. Sheffield was cheapest (but the basket still went north of £2000) with London and Edinburgh unexpectedly coming in the middle.

“Consumers are paying the price for shopping on the high street. 95 per cent of all the prices we found could be beaten online and the average mark-up on the best online price was a massive 31.79 per cent. That’s high street robbery,” says Mark Thomas, UK manager for Pricerunner. “There is obviously a cost associated with having a high street presence and some of that has to be passed on to the consumer. But with such variations in prices not only between cities but also between two ends of the same high street, consumers must not be fooled by in-store price points. The evidence is clear – it is cheaper to make your eventual purchase online and have the product delivered to your home.”

The research is published on the day on which the European Commission is expected to publish the draft of its Vertical Restraints Regulations, a process in which it looks as though major brands may gain the ability to discriminate against outlets without bricks and mortar retail premises.

The deadline for changes to the Vertical Restraints Regulations in Europe, which could result in manufacturers being able to discriminate against outlets which have only an online presence rather than bricks and mortar as well, is only five days away. There is still time to make your views known.

An EUBusiness.com report has more of the technical details here.