The provision of services in the EU Internal market via collaborative economy platforms and protection of consumers : actors, obligations and enforcement

Studia Iuridica 2025, t. 107, s. 132-155.

The objective of this article is to present the EU rules regarding the protection of consumers’ rights in the context of the provision of services in the EU internal market with the intermediation of collaborative economy platforms. The first approach to collaborative economy platforms entering the EU internal market focused on specific challenges posed by the triangular configuration of economic relationships of actors involved in the provision of services via such platforms (European Commission communication of 2016). This sector-specific approach of reflection shifted soon afterwards to a more general and overarching approach to all online platforms and even more general – to providers of information society services. After almost fifteen years of the presence of collaborative economy platforms in the EU internal market, it seems important to present the synthesis of this evolution of the EU approach and the resulting EU regulatory scheme. As a starting point, the article takes the challenges identified by academia and the EU institutions concerning the protection of consumers’ rights in contracts concluded with the intermediary of collaborative economy platforms, including: the legal classification of the actors involved in collaborative economy platforms as ‘consumers’ and ‘traders’, terms which are crucial for the application of the EU rules on consumer protection; the obligations of such platforms and the providers of underlying services in their relations with consumers; the division of liability between the collaborative economy platform and the provider of the underlying service in their relations with the consumer; and, last but not least, the role of collaborative economy platforms in enforcing the obligations of underlying service providers. These issues are presented with due account of the evolution of EU law since collaborative economy platforms appeared in the EU internal market. The article starts with a short presentation of collaborative economy platforms in the EU internal market and the challenges this posed for the application of EU law at the time. Then, the article investigates the EU law as it stands at present regarding the actors in the collaborative economy model from the traditional perspective in EU consumer law, distinguishing between a ‘consumer’ and a ‘trader’, and the obligations of collaborative economy platforms and providers of the underlying services in their relations with consumers. The final part scrutinises the relations between collaborative economy platforms and providers of the underlying services in terms of enforcement.

20 lat minęło jak jeden dzień? Prawne aspekty członkostwa Polski w Unii Europejskiej w dwudziestą rocznicę akcesji (Ogólnopolska konferencja naukowa, Warszawa 15.04.2024 r.)

Państwo i Prawo 2024, nr 10, s. 128-131.

Współautorstwo: Domańska, Monika; Smoleńska, Agnieszka

Prawo karne Unii Europejskiej : w poszukiwaniu harmonii

Euphony, harmony and dissonance in the international legal order = Eufonia, harmonia i dysonans w międzynarodowym porządku prawnym = Euphonie, harmonie et dissonance dans l’ordre juridique international : Liber amicorum Władysław Czapliński / edited by Krystyna Kowalik-Bańczyk, Karolina Wierczyńska, Andrzej Jakubowski ; review Maciej Taborowski. Warsaw : ILS PAS Publishing House, 2024, s. 461-470.

Swoboda świadczenia usług w modelu gospodarki dzielenia się : uprawnienia i obowiązki usługodawców w prawie Unii Europejskiej

Przegląd Ustawodawstwa Gospodarczego 2024, nr 12, s. 26-34.

W artykule przedstawiono wyniki analizy przepisów prawa UE regulujących swobodę świadczenia usług w modelu gospodarki dzielenia się, mającej na celu zidentyfikowanie uprawnień i obowiązków dostawców usług pośrednich i usług offline. W świadczeniu usług na rynku wewnętrznym w modelu gospodarki dzielenia się zaangażowane są trzy kategorie podmiotów: po pierwsze, dostawcy usług offline, czyli takich, które realizowane są w świecie materialnym; po drugie, odbiorcy usług offline i, po trzecie, operator platformy internetowej, który udostępnia aplikację umożliwiającą łączenie dostawców usług offline i odbiorców takich usług. Z uwagi na fakt, że ten model prowadzenia działalności gospodarczej na rynku wewnętrznym jest ciągle obecny, zasadne jest przedstawienie regulacji swobody świadczenia usług na rynku wewnętrznym z perspektywy dostawców usług pośrednich (online) i usług offline w dwóch wymiarach: uprawnień, jakie dostawcy ci wywodzą z prawa UE w relacjach z państwami członkowskimi, oraz obowiązków, jakie na takich dostawców nakładają przepisy prawa UE w relacji z odbiorcami ich usług.

The article analyses EU law regulating the freedom to provide services in a sharing economy model, from the perspective of the rights and obligations of providers of online and underlying services. Three groups of actors are engaged in providing services in the internal market of this business model: providers of underlying services, recipients of those underlying services and online platforms (with smartphone applications) which connect providers and recipients of underlying services. Although this business model is no longer of specific interest to the EU institutions or academia, it is still present in the Member States. Therefore, it seems useful to present two aspects of the freedom to provide these services from the perspective of providers of online and underlying services: rights that providers of services derive from EU law in relations with the Member States and obligations incumbent on providers of services according to EU law.

EU Law and the Member States’ Competence to Regulate the Operation of Collaborative Economy Platforms : Where Do We Stand after the Digital Services Act

European Business Organization Law Review 2024, t. 35, nr 2, s. 183-206.

The article analyses selected legal aspects of the functioning of collaborative economy platforms in the internal market of the European Union. The objective is to analyse the scope of the competences left to the Member States to regulate the operation of collaborative economy platforms, both these established on their territories and these benefitting from the freedom to provide crossborder services, after the adoption of the Digital Services Act. The article covers the evolution of EU law concerning online platforms (including collaborative economy platforms), interpretation of information society services, as well as scrutinises provisions of the E-commerce Directive and the Digital Services Act.