Applying the right to a fair trial to alternative consumer dispute resolution

The right to a fair trial is the cornerstone of the rule of law. However, court proceedings are too expensive, lengthy and complicated relative to the interests involved in low-value consumer disputes. Consequently, the national courts are not accessible for these disputes. The Dutch Foundation for Consumer Complaints Boards (CCB) fills this gap by providing a cheap, fast and simple alternative. As one of the Dutch ADR entities, the CCB’s proceedings are regulated via the ADR Directive and promoted in the EU as an alternative to court proceedings. This poses the question of whether the CCB should also live up to the same high standards as the courts and provide proceedings that comply with the right to a fair trial. This study answers this question in the affirmative. It argues in favour of a direct horizontal effect of Article 47 CFR. Furthermore, relevant procedural requirements for cADR and cODR proceedings are identified and analysed. The second half of this study focuses on the CCB proceedings. The CCB proceedings are described in detail and evaluated in light of the relevant procedural requirements. This evaluation shows that the proceedings largely satisfy the right to a fair trial. For example, the CCB is able to mitigate inequalities between litigants and to compensate for the litigant’s lack of technical and judicial expertise. However, improvements can – and must – be made. Therefore, this study advocates several changes, including changes to the recently introduced remote hearings and shortening the proceedings even further.

Dissertation: https://hdl.handle.net/11370/8f5e2586-ee42-442f-8345-2b1449d47ca0