The EC published a Commission Staff Working Document Evaluation of Directive 2002/65/EC concerning the distance marketing of consumer financial services.
The evaluation can be summarised at a high level as follows:
- The Directive has partially achieved it’s objective of improving consumer protection and trust.
- The effectiveness of pre-contractual information has been hampered by the practical limitations in providing the required content in a digital environments in a user-friendly way.
- The Directive has helped create a level playing field but the cross-border financial services market remains limited.
- The Directive can sometimes contradict local product-specific legislation but it still provides a sound safety net.
- The right of withdrawal for distance sales could be better enacted through additional mechanisms.
Overall, the evaluation finds that the Directive has been effective in increasing consumer protection.