These turning points have played an important role in shaping and promoting the strong development of e-commerce platforms in Vietnam, becoming an indispensable part of people’s economic and social life. According to data in the report titled “E-commerce Market – The Time of Shopping and Entertainment” by Kirin Capital released in early April 2024, the number of consumers who prioritize online shopping has now reached 50% and about 40% conduct transactions to buy and sell goods through e-commerce platforms. With the conveniences and incentives from e-commerce platforms with the goal of stimulating shopping, in the future, these numbers will continue to fluctuate in an upward direction. From there, issues are raised to protect consumer rights, promote healthy market development, comply with legal regulations and contribute to the sustainable development of the digital economy,…
1. Concept of e-commerce platform
After the Internet was introduced to our country in 1997, in 2001, the Government issued Decree 55/2001/ND-CP regulating the management, provision and use of Internet services, in order to build and create the initial legal basis for e-commerce.
In 2005, the first e-commerce platform in Vietnam, chodientu.vn, was officially launched, marking the beginning of the strong development of e-commerce in the country. One year later, the e-commerce platform Vatgia.com was launched, providing a platform for businesses and individuals to participate in buying and selling transactions. Becoming a stepping stone for a series of other large and small e-commerce platforms such as: Yes24.vn (2009), Tiki.vn (2010), Lazada (2012), Sendo.vn (2012), Adayroi.com (2015), Shopee (2016), … to be born and develop in Vietnam. Although e-commerce platforms in our country were born very early and have developed strongly in the past 10 years, it was not until 2013 that the content of Decree 52/2013/ND-CP was recorded for the first time, legal terms and specific regulations on “e-commerce platforms”. This is also the most important and detailed legal document related to the operation of e-commerce platforms in our country. According to Clause 9, Article 3, this Decree has interpreted the term “e-commerce trading floor” as “an e-commerce website that allows traders, organizations, and individuals who are not website owners to conduct part or all of the process of buying and selling goods and services on it.”
2. Classification of e-commerce trading floors
According to Clause 3, Article 25, “an e-commerce trading floor is a website that provides e-commerce services.”
There are two criteria for classifying e-commerce trading floors:
Based on the participating subjects:
- General e-commerce trading floors;
- Private e-commerce trading floors.
Based on the criteria for business industry subjects, including:
- Specialized e-commerce trading floors (Thegioididong, Chotot,…);
- General e-commerce trading floors (Shopee, Lazada,…).
3. Current status of Vietnamese legal regulations on goods traded on e-commerce platforms
3.1. Intellectual Property Protection
Intellectual property protection is the protection of rights relating to the intellectual property of goods and services. These intellectual property rights may include copyrights, trademarks, patents, industrial designs, and trade secrets.
Intellectual property protection helps ensure that those who create, invent, or develop products and services have the right to control and benefit from their creations.
3.2. Product Quality Assurance
Quality protection of goods is the assurance that the quality of goods in processes such as production, import, distribution and sale to the market must fully meet certain quality standards. This is a process to protect the interests of the parties, while helping to ensure the transparency and fairness of commercial activities.
Accordingly, goods entering the market must ensure the following factors:
- Quality assurance
- Quality inspection and certification
3.3. Protect consumer rights
According to the current Law on Consumer Protection 2010, it only provides general provisions on protecting the legitimate rights and interests of consumers when participating in the commercial environment, and there are no special provisions to apply to e-commerce with its own specific characteristics. The upcoming Law on Consumer Protection 2023 will officially take effect from July 1, 2024, and the guiding document of the Law aims to enhance the responsibility for protecting consumer rights in e-commerce. In particular, this new Law has added Chapter 3 to stipulate the responsibilities of business organizations and individuals towards consumers in specific transactions. Accordingly, Article 39 stipulates the responsibilities of business organizations and individuals towards consumers in goods transactions on cyberspace.
Along with the rapid development of e-commerce as well as e-commerce trading floors in our country in recent times. The State, functional agencies, e-commerce trading floors, individuals, businesses doing business on e-commerce trading floors and consumers have encountered many challenges and difficulties in implementing the law on goods traded on e-commerce trading floors in Vietnam today.
In order to regulate activities on the protection of goods traded in e-commerce as well as e-commerce trading floors, our State has also issued timely regulations, policies, and overall plans with the goal of developing national e-commerce in the long term in many stages such as: Decision 689/QD-TTg (2014-2020 period); Decision 645/QD-TTg (2021-2025 period), Decree No. 52/2013/ND-CP, Circular No. 01/2024/TT-BKHCN, Law on Product and Goods Quality, Law on Intellectual Property, Law on Protection of Consumer Rights and other relevant legal documents,…
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_Nguyen Thu Phuong_