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Italy- Action of the Federation of German Consumer Organizations dismissed in two of three points
- Request for the provision of date of birth and transfer of information on goods permissible
- Court for modification of the consent form for the use of data
Today the Regional Court of Munich (Landgericht München) dismissed the action of the Federation of German Consumer Organisations ( vzbv, Verbraucherzentrale Bundesverband e.V) against the Payback Discount Organization ( Payback Rabattverein e.V.) in two important points. Thus, request for the provision of a complete date of birth on the Payback registration form is legal. It is also permissible for Payback partners to convey information on purchased goods and services to Payback. With this decision, the court supports the argument of Payback that this information is necessary for the definite identification of members or for the correct booking of bonus points and provision of information on inquiries.
“The trust of our members is extremely important to us. Therefore we take the subject of data protection very seriously and make every effort to achieve maximum transparency and security “, said René Beutner, speaker of Loyalty Partner GmbH who operates the Payback program. “We are pleased that the court today has confirmed that we are in the right with regard to these two important issues. The decision confirms our position that we only collect data from members which is necessary to carry out our program.”
In the third point of the vzbv action, which was simultaneously also filed against other bonus program operators, the question was in what form a customer has to give his consent to the use of his data for market research and advertising purposes.
In this point the court followed the plaintiff, who insisted that a customer should have to actively tick. Payback on the other hand employs the practiced and internationally used procedure, in which customers object to the use of their data with a cross. This form of consent was introduced after consulting the proper supervisory authority for data protection, the Payback data protection officer, as well as the association of all German State supervisory authorities (Düsseldorfer Kreis).
Payback is still convinced that this generally used and customer-friendly procedure meets the interests of the customers. Payback will therefore appeal the judgment in this issue. For this reason the judgment of the Regional Court will not become final until further notice.