AGCM

PRESS RELEASE

UNFAIR COMMERCIAL PRACTICE AGAINST MEDICAL HEALTH OPERATORS: FINE BY ANTITRUST AUTHORITY OF €0.5 MILLION AGAINST PORTUGUESE COMPANY

In the light of an aggressive commercial practice, the Italian Antitrust Authority imposed a fine of €500,000 on a Portuguese company United Directorios Lda. Proceedings were launched on the basis of reports by several Italian medical health operators that received invoices for large amounts, even in excess of €1,000, for registration on an online database which they never asked to join.

The commercial practice in question was particularly well-structured and complex. At the start the company collected data regarding medical health operators without informing them in advance. This information was then published in a database called “Italian Registry of Physicians” exclusively accessible online on the site www.registromedici.com.

The responsible officials of United Directorios Lda would then systematically contact the medical health operators appearing on the Register and ask them to verify and to correct their own data appearing in a form: once signed and retransmitted, this entailed the unwitting subscription to the computerized service for paid advertisements described above, for a three-year period. In case there was no written cancellation, the link was automatically renewed.

Only after expiry of the deadline to exercise the right to withdraw as envisaged in the contract, the Portuguese company would then proceed to issue an invoice for the first annual instalment. This would be followed by a long series of requests for payment of the unpaid instalments, characterized by an increasingly aggressive tone, with the addition of further amounts by way of interest on late payments and recovery costs.

In several other cases, moreover, United Directorios Lda strengthened its intimidating tactics, repeating its requests for payment and threatening to appeal to a foreign judicial authority to undertake proceedings for the compulsory recovery of debts from micro medical health operators involved in commercial activities. The same company would at the same time fear the possibility of a further economic burden with regard to the amounts already requested.

Rome, 7 December 2015