The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has found that appliances retailer Marks Electrical pre-selected and charged customers for extra services without their express agreement.
This impacted customers that bought a range of essential household items – including washing machines, dishwashers and cookers – through the Marks Electrical website.
Those customers were automatically opted into one or both of the following services
- ‘Recycle Old Appliance’ service removing the customer’s old appliance at the time of delivery, which is then recycled
- ‘Unwrap & Recycle Packaging’ service unwrapping and removing packaging for the newly purchased product or products at the time of delivery, which is then recycled
Under consumer law, consumers must have genuine choice over whether to pay for an extra product or service which they may or may not wish to choose. Businesses are not allowed to use pre-ticked boxes or other forms of automatic opt-in for optional extras which cost money – as was the case with Marks Electrical. As a result, the CMA has fined the company £720,000 and ordered it to refund around £600,000 in total.
The CMA’s investigation looked at conduct from April 2025 – when its new consumer powers came into force – to November 2025. Marks Electrical stopped the conduct immediately after the CMA opened an investigation and engaged constructively. Having admitted to breaking the law and agreeing to settle the case early with the CMA, the company received a 40% reduction to its financial penalty, in line with CMA guidance.
Affected customers do not need to take any action. Marks Electrical will contact affected customers about their refund, which will be automatically refunded to the method they used to pay for their appliance. If that is not possible, the customer will be sent a cheque. The amount repaid to individuals will vary depending on how much they paid-for extra services, but the average payout will be around £15.
Emma Cochrane, Executive Director of Consumer Protection at the CMA, said
The law is absolutely clear that automatically opting customers into extra charges is never ok.
Buying a new washing machine, dishwasher or cooker is expensive and people should have the right to decide if they want optional extras – not be landed with costs that they did not agree to.
All businesses need to check their policy on automatic opt-ins – the bottom line is that they should not be used. If businesses break the law, we’ll continue to issue fines and secure refunds for people.
When the CMA’s strengthened consumer powers came into force, it committed to tackling unlawful online pricing practices to ensure shoppers were not left out of pocket.
Under these new powers, the CMA has so far secured over £1.3 million in refunds for customers and levied fines totaling nearly £5 million.
Further details about the investigation can be found on the Marks Electrical consumer protection enforcement case page.
Notes to editors
- Opting consumers into making extra payments under a contract without obtaining their express consent is prohibited by the Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013. The CMA used its powers under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 to take enforcement action and impose the penalty.
- Marks Electrical is managing all refunds and affected consumers will receive a letter or email. Some refunds have already been paid.
- The CMA collects payments on behalf of HM Treasury relating to penalties imposed by the CMA. All payments collected are transferred to HMT’s Consolidated Fund.
- If a business infringes consumer protection law, the CMA can fine it up to 10% of its global turnover (or £300,000 where this is higher than the 10% figure).
- If a business breaches undertakings or directions given to the CMA, it could face fines of up to 5% of its global turnover – with additional daily penalties for continued non-compliance.
- All enquiries from journalists should be directed to the CMA press office by email on [email protected] or by phone on 020 3738 6460.
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