Consumer Law in Pakistan
Consumer laws aim to protect the consumers from being misled by the sellers or merchants. Inherently, there is an information asymmetry, which allows the seller to take undue advantage of the buyers. As we have seen earlier, this is now an innate and inevitable risk in the current economic system with division of labour. The three principles that define any good consumer law are responsibility, accountability and transparency.
After the partition and independence, Pakistan decided to continue with the British Colonial created for Colonial India for consumer protections. This included commercial legislation and common law case law precedents. Some of the main legislation that emerged affected consumer transactions are Contact Act 1872 and Sales of Goods Act 1935. Consumer protection is now a provincial matter and currently there are five specific legislative areas relating to consumer laws in Pakistan. We will look at the protection in specific provinces, mentioning the similarities in procedure and law and explaining differences, if any.
The operative act in Punjab is the Punjab Consumer Protection Act, 2005 (PCPA) [1] legislated by the Punjab Assembly and Punjab Consumer Protection Rules, 2009 made by the Punjab Government under the Act. As there is no federal consumer institution; Punjab has a created a directorate of consumer protection council. The directorate is tasked with, among other things, creating and evaluating district and provincial councils and creating awareness among the consumers. The directorate does a good job in running electronic and print media advertisements to inform the consumers. The provincial council has the role of evaluating the consumer situation in the province as well as drafting regulations.
District councils have a more active role in protecting consumers, and can investigate matters as well as make decisions. District councils also make reports on their activities and situation in the respective districts.
Punjab
a. Procedure
Any consumer can raise an issue by following this procedure: a 15 day notice is served to the provider, seeking for the provider to redress the issue by (repair, replacement or refund as the case may be) as well as remedy the damage, if any, to the consumer. If after 15 days, the matter is not resolved, the consumer can lodge the case in consumer court against the alleged breach of their rights. There exists a right of appeal for either party to Lahore High Court.
b. Laws and Rights
The directorate asks the consumers to be vigilant and seek all possible evidence of purchase, such as sale receipt/invoice. To ensure that items are not already expired, to check that the rate list and read ingredients. Law protects defects in goods and faulty services. Manufacturers have a duty to disclose the rates, ingredients and expiry of the products. The test is that of an ordinary person who will have reasonably expected to handle the product. Once a defect has been shown, the burden is on the manufacturer to show that they did not know and could not have known about the defect. There is further defence of “economic practicality” if a safer design existed but was not used. The courts are asked to consider this practicality and the severity of the defect and injury it may have caused. For example, a motorcycle helmet with an extra padding may prevent a severe injury, then the cost of the padding, not likely to be high, is considered against the severity of likely head injury.
In terms of services, if a professional is regulated by another law, then that law will apply. If there is no standard applied by a professional or trade body or the state, then the test of reasonable services. Though the damages are limited to actual loss incurred, the law prevents liability from being excluded through exclusion clauses.
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