German support for thirty bees

[Traumflug]

@lesley said in German support for thirty bees:

We realize things are very different over there in regard to the ecommerce laws

I think this is mostly a misconception. Some 90% of what's "german e-commerce law" is based more or less directly on EU legislation. For some parts, like revocation terms, EU law is applied directly. For other parts it's done by national implementations. In short: law for all EU countries is (almost) the same.

What makes the situation in Germany so tedious is our (AFAIK, worldwide unique) Abmahnwesen. Every competitor of a website can hire a lawyer and send the owner of that website a Abmahnung (cease and desist letter) for whatever that competitor thinks is not in entire agreement with laws on that site. No police, no state attorney, no court, no judge required. So far it's still similar to other countries.

The really bad part here is, the website owner has to compensate (pay!) for the damage the competitor thinks he has suffered. And the website owner also has to pay for the lawyer. Unless that owner disagrees and pulls the case to court.

Result of this situation is that lawyers started to search for faults on websites, then to search for competitors which could claim damages and lawyer fees. If this is done with some scripting and series cease-and-desist letters, it can be a source of pretty big income. Kind of an "industry" was born. On top of that there are competitors which try to jerk their competition, of course.

Result of these revenue seeking lawyers is that even pretty minor faults get claimed. There are court cases where it was to decide whether it's sufficient to notify users about EU Online Dispute Resolution link or whether this link has to be clickable. Cases where website owners were found "guilty" to have their forename shortened to a single letter instead of having it written in full. Such stuff.

Tl;dr: at the bottom line, german shop owners have to comply with the about same laws as all other european shop owners, but they're way, way, way, more keen on getting everything right to the smallest detail. Because every detail done wrong comes with a bill, with loss of cash.

[Traumflug]

@mdekker said in German support for thirty bees:

You say that sites can be scanned with automated scripts. Do you happen to know one for sites based on PrestaShop/thirty bees?

Sorry, no, never been in that business. It's also more a guess. If I'd try to, I'd simply google for shops selling products similar to mine. Most items can be found pretty easily if you know what has to be there: imprint, revocation terms, "including taxes, without shipping fees" next to the price, such stuff. DRMasterChief and mannefred have named a few additional ones above.

[DRMasterChief]

Hi guys, are there any news for the "german" / European problem and has anyone worked on the details for EU compliance ?

Thank you

[Traumflug]

Advanced EU Compliance is now an official module. If one can build a compliant shop with PS 1.6, one can do it with thirty bees, too.

[MockoB]

@Traumflug did you try it with the community or other theme? It has incompatibility issues and as far as I know it has also with ps 1.6.1.x.

[Traumflug]

I installed it with community-theme-default and didn't notice any incompatibilities on the first glance. Didn't have a closer look, though.

[MockoB]

To be honest I tried it with thirty bees 1.0.0 and I even opened github bug report ... Recently I tried it on the custom theme I bought and it doesn't work. But the developer kindly proposed me to make it work for some cash ... we didn't negotiate the price yet because I'm on other stage of the project ...

[Pedalman]

Hello

I am another user from Germany. I run my shop via Prestashop for 5 years now. I am happy that TB supports the Advanced EU Compliance module now and may be Dekker finds a way to integrate it into TB's core. If complicated at all ;) than it will be the tax calculations. Anyway, you find these in the module. Incompatibilities were seen between this modul and Prestashop V1.6.x concerning smarty cache. Sometimes information about delivery time was shown twice on product information. Often in our shop after a complete checkout. Anyway, all information if found on the Prestashop Forum and there has also been ticket opened. But this was never really solved :( All you could do was do exclude certain parts from smarty caching in this module via editing the module. This was done very easily via {nocache}... {/nocache}

[lesley]

I don't think it will be integrated into the core. We need to keep it modular for the time being. The reason is if the regulations change, it will be easier and quicker for shop owners to update a module then to have to update their whole shops.

[DRMasterChief]

Yep, should be no problem to handle it as a module, most important is that the module works 100% and with all needs for the German / EU market.

Btw. is there any correct solution for "unit price" in TB ?

[DRMasterChief]

Btw. is there any correct solution for “unit price” in TB ? I have had some problems with unit price in the categorie (unit price was not displayed in categorie, only in the item site), and also not displayed in bestsellers, special offers .... this is also necessary for EU compliance module.

[Havouza]

When do you need the unit price shown? I can see it useful when you sell multipacks but not if you only sell single products: And is this needed for German compliance or EU, which is two very different things

[30knees]

@DRMasterChief Take a look at: https://forum.thirtybees.com/topic/447/base-unit-price-unit-price-module

@Havouza Yep, it's needed for German compliance, but should be the same throughout the EU.

[Havouza]

I have not found 1 line about it in any other country. After 7 years in Germany, I can believe they demand it. I am sure there is a lot of lawyers that make a living on searching for this things.

[Havouza]

Looking at the module in the link I would say that is totally different thing. I am sure that this is the same in all EU. But shoving unit price if you sell t-shirts one by one, it can only happen in Germany if it is the law. No EU regulation for sure

[30knees]

Here is the Directive for base/unit prices: http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=celex:31998L0006 So it should be the same throughout the EU.

[Havouza]

As I read it, it is not for all products But it will take a lot of reading.

However what I realise now is that the cart does not change the total price if I add one by pressing the +. Is that really correct?

[Havouza]

"Member States may waive the obligation to indicate the unit price of products for which such indication would not be useful because of the products' nature or purpose or would be liable to create confusion."

[Traumflug]

And is this needed for German compliance or EU, which is two very different things

Not really. Regulations are about the same, just the urge to comply with them is much higher in Germany. Like I tried to explain above.

[Traumflug]

"Member States may waive the obligation to indicate the unit price of products for which such indication would not be useful ..."

Yes. Which means, certain products need this feature activated in some countries, but not in others. The feature its self remains the same.

[Havouza]

So there is a difference in the interpretation of the directive

[30knees]

@Havouza Directives set out the framework, but within that framework everyone has to comply by making their own local law. All EU countries have a unit price obligation. It might vary in the details, but generally it will be the same. That is why in (large) supermarkets throughout the EU you will always find for things like ketchup, etc. the unit price indicated.

[Havouza]

But not for tshirts. That is what I mean

[30knees]

@Havouza Yep, you're right. It's generally not applicable to clothing.

[Havouza]

Or cars or computers or shoes or.....