Apply unfair trading prohibition to financial services – ACCC

Mike Taylor

Managing Editor and Publisher

5 June 2026

Financial products and services should be fully subject to the same general unfair trading practices prohibition that prevail elsewhere in the economy, according to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC).

In a recommendation which has implications for most major financial institutions including the investment platforms, the ACCC has told the Senate Economics Legislation Committee that it has a strong view on the need for inclusion of financial products and services.

In doing so, the ACCC said it wanted to reiterate the need for a general unfair trading practices prohibition to be implemented in the Australian Securities and Investments Commission Act “to ensure effective protections from harm, and an improved standard of business conduct, across the economy.

It said that “such reforms are critical to ensuring consistency n protections and avoiding regulatory gaps, given there are likely to be situations in which it is unclear on face value whether a particular product or service is a financial product or service, or where the product or service being offered is a mixture of financial and non-financial,” it said.

“An inconsistent policy approach to unfair trading practices, depending on whether or not something is a financial product or service, will increase the regulatory and compliance burden for businesses, and will lead to regulatory gaps, which will mean that many harmful practices can continue or practices may shift to exploit these gaps,” the ACCC said.

The competition regulator’s submission went on to list examples of conduct which it had previously identified as being “un-or-underregulated yet still cause significant harm:

▪ Using influence to cause a consumer or small business to agree to: o vary a contract that would cause the consumer or business material detriment (whether financial or otherwise) or o pay a sum of money that the person is not contractually entitled to.

▪ Systemic actual or effective refusal to provide remedies to consumers and small businesses that they are legally entitled to.

▪ Failing to provide an accessible and effective contact point for customer service support.

▪ Failing to take reasonable steps to prevent the sale or promotion of unsafe goods on a platform or website owned, operated or controlled by the business.

▪ Failing to disclose changes to a product or service provided under an agreement.

This could include conduct such as an insurer reducing the scope of its policies without notifying members while continuing to charge the same fees, causing them unexpected out of pocket costs.

▪ Unreasonably inhibiting access to, or enjoyment of, a product or service already purchased. This could include:

o a business implementing software changes to an interconnected product, which fundamentally changes its functionality or performance, and without providing the consumer with an appropriate remedy or recourse to compensate for this.

o inappropriate use of the data on the customer’s use of the product which a business holds via interconnected products.