It was found that unfair transaction practices by large retailers, centered on online shopping malls, have still not improved. Many suppliers that transact with major retailers said they bear the expense even if they are dissatisfied with the market information provided by the retailers, for fear of transactional disadvantages.
On the 15th, the Fair Trade Commission announced the results of the "2025 written fact-finding survey on transaction practices in the distribution sector," conducted on 7,600 suppliers that transact with 42 large retailers.
Among suppliers that transact with large supermarkets and online shopping malls, 5.9% responded that they had paid information provision fees. Of these, only 27.4% said they were satisfied with the information provided, while 72.6% assessed that the information had low effectiveness.
Even so, 44% of the companies that paid the fee said they had no choice but to bear the expense to maintain the transaction. Many also responded that they feared disadvantages if they refused to pay the fee, or that it was practically difficult to refuse the retailer's demand. Some companies said they were asked to pay the fee as a condition for contract renewal, or that they paid the expense without being provided any data.
By business type, specialty stores had the highest share of responses saying they were unfairly made to bear information provision fees at 21.1%, followed by convenience stores (18.5%) and online shopping malls (17.2%). The share with experience paying the fee was also highest for convenience stores (17.8%), followed by specialty stores (9.7%) and online shopping malls (8.2%).
By type of unfair act, the problems of online shopping malls stood out more. In key categories such as price reduction of payments due, delayed payment, unfair returns, unfair shifting of promotional expense, coercion of exclusive transactions, and unfair collection of sales incentives, the rate of experiencing unfair acts by online shopping malls was the highest among business types. The Korea Fair Trade Commission (FTC) explained that as the online distribution market grows, unfair practices that differ from offline are being repeated.
An official at the Korea Fair Trade Commission (FTC) said, "We plan to examine unfair practices unique to the online distribution market and review supplementary measures and needed system improvements for the current legal framework, which was designed with an offline focus."