What is an impressum? Trader identity on a website

The rule

Both directives leave penalties to the Member States, which must make them “effective, proportionate and dissuasive” (e-Commerce Directive Art. 20, Consumer Rights Directive Art. 24). So the consequences differ by country.

In Germany the e-Commerce duty is in § 5 DDG, which the Act itself lists among the provisions that implement the directive. The Court of Justice has read the contact requirement in Case C-649/17: no duty to set up a telephone line or new email address in all circumstances, but a duty to show a means of direct and efficient contact clearly.

Two enforcement routes sit behind it. The first is public. Under § 33(2) No. 1 DDG, a § 5 disclosure that is not kept available, or is wrong or incomplete, is an administrative offence if done intentionally or negligently, and § 33(6) No. 3 sets a ceiling of EUR 50,000.

The second is private and is the one behind the reputation of the Impressum. Under § 3a UWG, acting against a rule that regulates market behaviour is unfair if it is capable of noticeably affecting the interests of consumers or rivals. Under § 8 UWG a rival who sells goods or services to a not insignificant extent, certain business associations and qualified consumer bodies can demand that it stop. Section 13(1) asks them to send a warning letter first (an Abmahnung) and offer a settlement with a contractual penalty. Under the current text, § 13(4) No. 1 excludes a rival’s claim for the cost of that letter where the matter concerns information duties in e-commerce or digital services. The claim to stop remains.

What PeekWell checks and how

EU-14 asks one question: can a visitor find out who runs this business from the public pages? The scan answers it from what the pages show, not from a register.

The scan is automated. It looks through your public pages for an imprint or legal-notice page and notes which identity details it shows: company name, address, register and VAT details, an email address and a phone number. Missing details are listed one by one. A German imprint page is expected from sites that target Germany or Austria. For other sites the scan expects the directive-level identity details only.

The scan has limits, and the report says so. It reads what’s on the public pages it visited. It can’t tell whether the address is where the business is really established, whether a register number is current, or whether a profession-specific line is required. A Passed means the expected details were observed on the pages scanned. It doesn’t say the site complies. The notice’s own content is checked in EU-08 and EU-09.

Why it matters for a company

This is one of the easiest gaps for an outsider to spot, because the only test is whether a page exists and what is on it.

In Hamm in 2011 a seller with a turnover of about EUR 694 over six weeks was treated as a trader, and the court found that giving no name or address went against § 5 TMG and ordered him to cover EUR 755.80 of a rival’s lawyer’s fees. A rival’s claim for the cost of that kind of letter is now excluded by § 13(4), but the court’s reading of the duty is the same one the DDG now carries. In Düsseldorf in 2013 a rival that traded in used road-building machinery obtained an order against a portal operator whose advertisement form let dealers publish offers without the exact company name with legal form, or the trade register and number. The order was backed by a possible fine of up to EUR 250,000 for each case of non-compliance with it.

The Amazon case shows that the content of the duty is argued too: a consumer federation took how amazon.de showed its phone number to the German federal court, and the answer came from the Court of Justice in 2019.

For a company the consequences are of three kinds. Anyone with a browser can find an imprint gap, including a rival looking for one. The remedy sought is usually to stop and to sign a settlement with a contractual penalty, which binds the company from then on. And a missing address is the first thing a customer with a complaint looks for.

Smaller companies and larger companies

The duty has no size threshold. A sole trader and a listed retailer owe the same information. Only the way it goes wrong differs.

In a small company the site is a template or a hosted shop. The imprint was copied from another site, or the business changed form and the page was never touched. Marketplace and social profiles are a second source: the shop page is complete, but the seller’s listing on a platform has no identity details at all, which is the pattern in the Hamm decision. Often nobody reads these pages, so a warning letter may be how the gap comes to light.

In a larger company the problem is spread out. Several brands, country sites and microsites each need their own details, the legal entity differs by market, and a footer template can be reused on a site that sells under another company’s name. Contact channels get replaced by chatbots and forms, which is the question the Amazon case tested: whether the means offered are direct and efficient and are clearly shown. Platform operators also face the question whether their listing forms prompt sellers for the details, which the Düsseldorf order turned on.

How to fix it

1. List what the law asks for your business. Write down the legal name and form, the street address where you are established, the people authorised to represent the company, the commercial register and number, the VAT ID, and any supervisory authority or professional body that applies to your trade.
2. Add two ways to reach you. Give an email address and a second quick channel, such as a phone number or a contact form that sends a reply. The Court of Justice accepted other channels besides a phone line as long as they allow direct and efficient contact and are clearly shown.
3. Put the page where people look. Create one imprint or legal-notice page and link it in the footer of every page, including the checkout. For German-language sites, the link text Impressum is the one visitors expect.
4. Make the text real. Use text on the page rather than an image, so that people with screen readers and Peeky can read it.
5. Cover every place you sell. Repeat the details on marketplace listings and social profiles that sell for you, using the fields the platform provides for it. Give each site its own correct entity.
6. Re-scan. Run a scan again. The finding should clear once the page is reachable and each element is on it.